“Health care is more than looking after patients. It is looking after the Earth and the environment.”

about david shearman and his interests

David Shearman is Emeritus Professor of Medicine at the University of Adelaide, South Australia. He studied medicine and science at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.

With the late Professor Tony McMichael he founded Doctors for the Environment Australia.

Until his retirement David Shearman was a physician and gastroenterologist with the belief "Patients come first".

 
 

Climate change caused by economic growth, consumerism and the increasing population of the world now threatens the integrity of the biological Earth. Our life support systems, the ecological services in the soil and the sea, upon which we depend for food, are sick and many are dying.

The health impacts of climate change are already upon us with an increase in deaths from heat stroke and the natural disasters of flood, storm and fire. Many societies are becoming unstable because of drought and there is suffering from stress, depression and the migration of populations.

This site illustrates books and articles that describe these events and the feeble human responses to these threats. Exposed are the inadequate role of governments, individuals and academia in addressing these issues and suggestions are made for reforms in economic and governance systems and in democracy itself.

 
 
 
Desecrated Cathedral

Desecrated Cathedral

 

LATEST articles and REPORTS

Featured
Treasurer Chalmers should have attended the biodiversity COP16

Pearls and Irritations
Climate will continue to have extensive coverage in the world media but biodiversity and COP16 will be largely ignored particularly in US and Australian major media outlets. Our two nations are birds of a feather, preening themselves that they have the wisdom to continue growth in their GDP. The US does not attend biodiversity COPs; it is the only absent nation. Australia has the courage to attend despite its appalling environmental record. The founding President of the Centre for the Enhancement of the Steady State Economy, (CASSE) Professor Brian Czech wrote a Primer on Economic Growth and Biodiversity for the COP16 meeting, an article on an alternative economy; quite simply the cause of biodiversity loss is The Economy. Read more…

Submission to the WA EPA on the Valhalla Gas Exploration project West Kimberley

Professor Melissa Haswell and Emeritus Professor David Shearman
In this submission we present evidence supporting our severe concerns about the health and wellbeing implications for the proposed drilling and hydraulic fracturing of 20 wells in the Kimberley region near Derby. We urge the EPA to step back and re-evaluate the copious evidence of harms to the environment and human health that have accumulated since the Inquiry in 2019. Even now, new and alarming evidence continues to emerge on a monthly basis. A recent spate of research is demonstration the atmospheric harm of methane emissions on global warming, the USA and Australia being particularly responsible. Read the submission...

Climate and environment: both sides of the coin are tarnished

Pearls and Irritations
In October the International Conference COP 16 in Cali, Colombia will focus on biodiversity. The President will be Colombia’s Environment Minister Susana Muhamad prominent in curtailing deforestation in her country. President Muhamad has said, “The climate has much more awareness and political investment, but we are not seeing the other side of the coin, and it’s dangerous for humanity. One of the main purposes for Cop16 in Cali is to make biodiversity and the global biodiversity framework as politically relevant as the climate agenda.” She said that focussing on reducing carbon emissions while failing to restore and protect natural ecosystems would be “dangerous for humanity” and risk societal collapse. Read more...

My Journey Through The Social Media Swamp

New Matilda
Recently, New Matilda announced it had suspended use of its Facebook and Twitter accounts, on the basis of the harm social media was causing in society. Childhood Protection Week has just passed and Australia’s eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman writes, “Our research shows that almost two-thirds of 14 – 17-year-olds have viewed harmful content (on social media) in the past year including drug use, self-harm, disordered eating and violent pornography and extremist imagery.” In my mind this requires drastic action. South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas has said, “The government is now going to step in, we’re going to ban kids (under 14) from getting access to these accounts." Read more...

Climate Policy Remains a Dirty Deal for Children

Pearls and Irritations
The recent Climate Analytics Report indicates that Australia plays a major role in sustaining elevated global emissions, threatening the goals of the Paris Agreement. There are many thousands of preventable deaths caused by fossil fuels from climate change itself, air pollution and from the direct action on humans by toxins in gas. All these effects are more prevalent in children. Just five wealthy governments the new ‘petrostates’, Australia, Canada and Norway the UK and the US are responsible for 51% of planned expansion from new oil and gas fields through 2050 and are the biggest climate hypocrites in 2023. Read more...

Bad banks, culpable coal industry, compliant government all in bed together

Pearls and Irritations
A People’s Development Bank would have been appropriate to the needs and financial security of production in rural and regional Australia ever since the Commonwealth Bank Australia (CBA) was privatised. Crucially the rural sector must lead the charge for Australia to retain our life support systems. For decades the coal mining industry receiving loans from banks has been aware of the deaths and illness caused by their product, reported in the Medical Journal of Australia in 2011. In 2023 the ABC reported that Australia’s big four banks loaned $3.6 billion to fossil fuel companies. Read more…