The dual crises of Climate Change and COVID-19 (part one): issues and anxieties

Introduction

As travellers we experience ancient ruins, stunning architecture, up-close safaris and fantastic landscapes. At the same time, we are conscious that such places and wildlife are threatened or undergoing change, perhaps irreversibly so, in the face of climate heating, habitat destruction, over-tourism or encroaching development. We are witnessing this at a critical time when that sense of permanence and stability is being lost. For the first time in Earth’s history, mankind’s activities are changing the planetary life-support systems. A growing group of scientists believe we are on the verge of a 6th mass extinction. Some assert we have moved into the Anthropocene Age that acknowledges the profound impact human activities are having on the evolution of the planet’s ecosystems, especially through resultant climate change.

Now in the midst of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) crisis, it is likely that more immediate anxieties and fears about the virus and the lockdowns introduced by governments have meant concerns for the climate crisis have been pushed to the side. Yet, the response to the pandemic has led to less air pollution from vehicles, less CO2 emissions from international flights and nature reclaiming some lost or quieter territories. Swans have been seen swimming in Venetian canals and goats have been roaming the streets of Llandudno, Wales! For those who have been able to get out for exercise and walk around their neighbourhood in unseasonably warm spring weather (at least as far as the UK is concerned), there has been joy in seeing the spring bloom, despite knowing that an invisible and potentially deadly virus is lurking around. This has allowed a glimpse into what a greener, more secure future could look like.

But will these tendencies be ephemeral or have lasting consequences? Any credible plans for the recovery from the virus and lockdown need to be linked to climate heating and greater environmental benefit. During the COVID-19 pandemic, people have demonstrated their willingness to change behaviour and lifestyles. The crisis has shown dramatically that major changes can be implemented in a short space of time if the situation demands it along with the will to act. Arguably, the climate crisis is an even greater level of threat, but with the right messaging, what may have previously seemed difficult might now be more feasible.

Post-COVID-19, there is an emerging consensus that things will have to be different in a ‘new normal’. Although there is a lot of debate about what that means from eating in restaurants to a reshaped geopolitical order, this is by no means guaranteed, as voices on the political right get fidgety about the increased role of the state (e.g. former Canadian Prime Minister, Stephen Harper) or lobby for fossil fuel interests. The Provincial Energy Minister in Alberta has said that it’s a good time to build an oil pipeline because public health restrictions limit protests against them!

The issue

Rise in average global temperatures (Image: Berkeley Earth)

The science shows that global temperatures have risen without precedence since industrialisation. Scientific reports continue to be published highlighting the continuing trends of our nature and climate emergencies. Just to see a summary of key headlines and statistics makes for alarming and sober reading.

Icelandic ‘Death of a Glacier’ memorial plaque (Image: My Modern Met)

In the year before the COVID-19 pandemic, glaciers continued to melt, fires raged in the Amazon Basin, California, Australia and the Arctic, storms left parts of the Bahamas and Japan devastated. In the UK, the severe floods of recent years have become regular events as residents of Somerset, Severn Valley, Carlisle, and Yorkshire can testify. These are just some of the latest manifestations that highlight the profound crisis our planet is facing. Attention was drawn when Iceland unveiled a memorial to the first glacier to be completely lost to global heating. More recently new research has indicated Arctic summer sea ice could be lost by 2050, even if carbon emissions are cut. Some models even suggest the Arctic could also become ice free in winter. A new ecosystem is establishing itself in parts of Antarctica due to the warming climate. Following 30 years of research, the UK’s Meteorological Office’s Hadley Centre declared “The climate now is completely different from what we had 30 years ago. It is completely outside the bounds of possibility in natural variation …The human fingerprint is everywhere.”

The next 10 years will determine whether there is any chance of preventing the worst scenarios of climate change. If we have not halved global greenhouse gas emissions by 2030, we will be unable to avoid devastating tipping points that would undermine global economic security, raise geopolitical tensions and pose existential human threats.

As we live through these unprecedented times, we still await the commensurate scale of response. The rhythms of hitherto ‘normal’ political and economic life, such as electoral cycles, five-year plans, strategic planning, annual budgeting etc are not recognised by the natural world. This perpetuates a continuing disconnect. It seems unforgivable that with the existential gravity of the natural and climate emergencies fully revealed, governments and others in positions of power have not responded with alacrity and on the scale required before the major natural systems fall beyond repair.

Tipping points

COP25 Climate Change Conference, whose outcome was widely regarded as disappointing

The 2020’s are acknowledged to be a critical tipping point for defining the condition of the planet and mankind for the next centuries. To anybody who thinks this is alarmist or overly dramatic, can we really afford to adopt a ‘wait and see’ attitude, or wait for the outcome of another study? We will only get one chance at this. At the Conference of the Parties (COP25) meeting in Madrid (December 2019), the UN Secretary general declared that we were facing the point of no return.

In some areas we may already have passed the tipping point. Are we really at a similar moment comparable to the Cuban Missile Crisis when the world seemed to be heading towards nuclear war? There is a danger of complacency and agreeing inadequate targets despite all the troubling news and reports. Millions face the prospect of no longer being able to live in lands that are already regarded as marginal with major ramifications for migration, food security and health. Is it any wonder that for many ‘eco-anxiety’ has become a recognized mental response?

We can ill-afford not to reform our economic and governing systems in the time we have available to us? At the same time, we cannot easily dismiss the dangers of China and the USA pursuing fossil fuel-led economic recovery programmes that would undermine decarbonisation-based Green New Deal recovery policies.

Greta Thunberg leading the school strike movement (Image: Alamy)

Fortunately, resistance to ‘business as normal’ and pleas for a saner, greener world are increasingly being expressed and reaching into mainstream discourse. School strikes, Extinction Rebellion protests, national and local declarations of Climate Emergencies, Green New Deal proposals and appeals from other forums signify that many are now seriously confronting the unfolding crisis. There is an urgency to address the ecological and climate emergency. Greta Thunberg has been able to keep the message stark and simple in speaking truth to power. In response to the reluctance of the EU to set more ambitious climate targets for 2030, she called out: “When your house is on fire you don’t wait a few more years to start putting it out, and yet this is what the [EU] commission are proposing today.” She has regularly urged powerful political and business leaders to “listen to the science”. Today’s youth is imploring adults to protect their future.

Psychology and eco-anxiety

An increasingly recognised condition (Image: Shutterstock)

As we see and learn of the destructive effects on the world around us, ‘eco-anxiety’ is being increasingly felt by many. It is logical, even sensible, to feel anxious about the way planetary life and the basis of our existence is being severely injured. There is nothing irrational or absurd about it. Even those who feel unaffected by the scientific evidence, or for whom the melting of the polar ice caps seems remote and intangible, matters closer to home and everyday life such as more severe storm damages, fear of flooding, prolonged droughts etc provide a counter narrative.

Such is the perceived scale of the emergencies that our efforts to address them can feel hopeless. The contribution of individual actions and lifestyle changes feel minuscule in light of the scale of the potential disaster facing us. We can easily become numbed into inaction and feel disconnected from the changes to the world around us and so it is important to safeguard ourselves against feelings of despair or helplessness.

One writer has a further take on the psychology around the climate crisis issue, calling it “a dual reality”. This appears when on the one hand, people acknowledge the science, trends and impacts, but on the other do not appear to be doing more to address it. In researching British politicians, she found a “socially organised denial” occurring, not so much in a collective conspiratorial sense, but from the inhibiting ‘tugs’ of the professional setting that they inhabit. This might stem from feeling a need to fit in, fear of being regarded as a maverick, or finding the issues do not register as sufficiently important with their electorate, so potentially affecting their personal political prospects and ambitions.

The global picture may sometimes seem bleak, but small actions can help (Image: Unsplash)

Psychologists say that doing something related to the issue, no matter how small or insignificant (rather than being a simple displacement activity), provides an antidote to distress or depression and can stimulate a more positive outlook. By trying to keep a sense of proportion, there is greater hope for addressing the issue affecting ourselves. We can address the global ‘picture’ by acting locally in ways that are more within our control.

Links to the pandemic crisis

The severity and speed of the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has brought personal and immediate fears and anxieties to much of the world’s population, perhaps pushing the climate emergency into the background. At the same time, millions of people are experiencing the reality of losing their livelihoods and income along with the anxiety that comes with inadequate access to testing and public health care. Yet the two crises are effectively two sides of the same coin. Many scientists, academics and thinkers are making this connection, recognising that it’s been the modern organisation of the economy and the continued destruction of nature that has made us vulnerable to the spread of these unknown viruses. Destruction of ecosystems, intensive husbandry and factory farming, live animal markets, highly urbanised societies and greater international travel have all contributed to our enhanced risk of further dangerous pandemics.

Live animal markets are suspected of being places where animal to human transmission can occur (Image: Shutterstock)

Research increasingly suggests that it is humanity’s destruction of biodiversity that creates the conditions for new viruses and diseases such as COVID-19 to arise. Once land is converted for human use, the probability increases of contact and viruses jumping from one species to another, or if different species that aren’t naturally close to one another in the same environment are put more closely together (such as in barns or pens) they can interact and breed new strains of disease. It allows virus mutations to jump to other species and ultimately to infect humans.

A new discipline, Planetary Health, is emerging that focuses on the increasingly clear connections between the wellbeing of humans, other living things and entire ecosystems. As one commentator remarks: “We cut the trees; we kill the animals or cage them and send them to markets. We disrupt ecosystems, and we shake viruses loose from their natural hosts. When that happens, they need a new host. Often, we are it.”

Then whenever a virus crosses over to humans, the ease, scope and speed of 21st century international travel means it is able to spread extremely quickly and outpace any necessary governmental response. Perhaps COVID-19 will be a salutary lesson and trigger more precautionary preparations for another inevitable new virus. The only uncertainty is exactly when and where that will occur.

The evidence is clear that the climate and COVID-19 emergencies are in large measure consequences of destructive human activities. Similarly, there are suggestions that the way people have been able to react and combat their worries and anxieties about the two crises are not widely dissimilar. The means of coping with lockdown also offers suggestions for addressing eco-anxiety. Indeed, there are overlaps between them at various levels.

Part two looks at ways that offer more appealing scenarios and outlines how we might combat or even overcome the anxieties.

Further reading

Dave Fawbert, 'Eco-anxiety': how to spot it and what to do about it, BBC website, 27/03/2019

Nassos Stylianou et al, Climate change: Where we are in seven charts and what you can do to help, BBC website, 14/01/2020

John Vidal, 'Tip of the iceberg': is our destruction of nature responsible for Covid-19?, The Guardian, 18/03/2020

Jonathan Watts, 'Promiscuous treatment of nature' will lead to more pandemics – scientists, The Guardian, 07/05/2020

Jonathan Watts, 'The human fingerprint is everywhere': Met Office's alarming warning on climate, The Guardian, 27/05/2020

Rebecca Willis, 'I don't want to be seen as a zealot': what MPs really think about the climate crisis, The Guardian, 21/05/2020