AE: Ecology and Health: Climate, Food, and Justice

School of Medicine

Global climate change is the most pressing public health issue of our lifetime due to its impacts on disease and its potential to disrupt food production, infrastructure, transportation, medical supply chains, and healthcare delivery. This semester-long seminar invites health professional students to engage the relationship between our ecological crisis and human health and flourishing. While this topic is far-reaching, the discourse consider the relationship between climate change, health, and inequitable health outcomes. The course will also consider the diverse ways climate change will affect community flourishing including broader impacts on mental health and migration. We will consider both the problems that arise and practices of care in response. This course will examine healthcare's carbon footprint and consider healthcare policy as these relate to climate impacts. Throughout the course, we will consider ethical questions concerning justice and intergenerational ethics. We will fundamentally ask, "How do we care for our communities in the midst of and in response to ecological change?" Faculty for the course will include community colleagues/practitioners with along with Vanderbilt School of Medicine faculty and staff.