Opinion Editorial: Climate Change and the Common Good's Health

This assignment is an opinion editorial that critically analyzes the challenges in realizing the aspirations of the common good, specifically focusing on climate change and its negative impacts on health and well-being. The editorial explores how human actions, such as burning fossil fuels, deforestation, and livestock farming, contribute to climate change, air pollution, and global warming, leading to various health disorders, including respiratory and lung diseases, cardiovascular problems, and other ailments. It highlights the conflict between the desire for comfortable lives and the detrimental effects of environmental pollution on the common good. The editorial emphasizes the importance of a healthy environment as a human right and calls for proactive measures to prevent air pollution and protect future generations, referencing data from the World Health Organization and the Straitstimes to illustrate the global and national impacts of air pollution. The conclusion stresses the need for healthcare professionals and all members of society to advocate for governmental action to ensure a safe and healthy environment.

Running head: COMMON GOOD
COMMON GOOD
Name of the student:
Name of the university:
Author note:

1
COMMON GOOD
Climate change occurring because of air pollution is not an entirely new fact and it has
been making the headlines in the news throughout the last decade. The condition is becoming
worse mainly due to the actions of humans. Humans are found to be increasingly influencing the
climate and increasing the temperature of the earth by the burning of the fossil fuels, cutting
down of the rainforests as well as farming of the livestock (Lelieveld et al., 2015). These are
adding to the enormous amounts of greenhouse gases as well as causing global warming
exposing the world towards grave danger.
Huge number of disorders remains associated with air pollution that is caused by human
mainly respiratory and lung disorders. This might include asthma attacks as well as chronic
obstructive pulmonary disorders. Others are reduction in lung functioning, pulmonary cancer,
mesothelioma as well as pneumonia (Watts et al., 2015). Many of the studies have found
leukemia, birth defects, immune system defects, cardiovascular problems, neuro-behavioral
disorders and even liver and other types of problems occur in persons due to air pollution.
This is an ironical situation. The actions that are taken by human beings for the
development of the livelihood of the civilization are in turn becoming the main cause of the
destruction of the societies. Deforestation and clearing of forests (that prevent climate change)
are mainly done because of development of houses and cities for the increasing number of
population in more or less every nation (Portier et al., 2017). Therefore, the steps that are taken
to develop living places and shelters for humans by deforestation and clearing of forests are
indeed becoming the main contributors of climate change and hence affecting their health. Huge
burning of fossil fuels like petroleum for different vehicles is done by human for their
comfortable transportation and reach to destinations on time. Although it is helping human to

2
COMMON GOOD
live comfortable lives in present generation, they are resulting in releases of smoke and harmful
gases that are causing air pollution and even global warming.
One can argue that the rising aspiration of the population to live comfortable lives is
clashing with the better health outcomes of the people. Although they are living comfortably
with the help of scientific advancements making the regular lives much simpler and easier, they
are becoming the leading contributors of air pollution and climate change that are affecting the
wellbeing of the common goods (Kim et al., 2015).
According to ordinary political discourse, the concept of common good may be referred
to the facilities (whether cultural, material as well as institutional) that the members of the
community should provide to all members for successfully fulfilling a relational obligation - that
all individuals have to care for certain interests that people have in common. These might include
high quality road systems, police protection, public parks, courts and judicial systems. Hence,
having access to live in a healthy environment free from any form of pollution is the human right
and dignity of all people living in a community (Fuzzi et al., 2015). Every individual in the
society needs to take an extra initiative of not only preventing themselves from becoming a
contributor to air pollution and climate change but also take steps to prevent and discourage
others to cause air pollution pro-actively. Every individual has the human right to enjoy healthy
living environment and their human dignity needs to be ensured through proactive interventions
by concerned authorities.
To get a global picture of air pollution, one can consider the data that had been provided
by World Health Organization. One of their data shows that low and middle-income countries in
the WHO South-East Asia and Western Pacific Regions exhibit the largest air pollution related

3
COMMON GOOD
burden in the year 2012. About 3.3 million deaths have been linked with indoor air pollution and
2.6 million deaths being related to the outdoor air pollution.
Coming to detailed data put forward by WHO, it can be seen that about 40% of outdoor
air pollution related deaths are due to ischemic heart disorders, rest 40% are due to stroke, 11%
due to COPD, 6% due to lung cancer and rest 3% due to acute lower respiratory infections.
About 34% of the indoor air pollution, related deaths are due to stroke, 26% due to ischemic
heart disorders, 22% due to COPD, 12% due to acute lower respiratory infections and rest 6%
due to lung cancer (Kim et al. 2015). The Straitstimes is a leading daily in the nation of Australia
that also shows the extent of air pollution on the national level. It has shown that already 3000
premature deaths have taken place in Australia due to urban air pollution and the figures are
rising that are affecting changing weather conditions. Hence, it is extremely important for not
only healthcare professionals but also all members of the society to voice out the concerns and
advocates the issues to the governmental authorities so that proper measures can be taken for
ensuring healthy and safe environment for the common good and better quality life of coming
generations (Prus-Ustun et al., 2016).

4
COMMON GOOD
References:
Fuzzi, S., Baltensperger, U., Carslaw, K., Decesari, S., Denier Van Der Gon, H., Facchini, M.C.,
Fowler, D., Koren, I., Langford, B., Lohmann, U. and Nemitz, E., 2015. Particulate
matter, air quality and climate: lessons learned and future needs. Atmospheric chemistry
and physics, 15(14), pp.8217-8299.
Kim, K.H., Kabir, E. and Kabir, S., 2015. A review on the human health impact of airborne
particulate matter. Environment international, 74, pp.136-143.
Lelieveld, J., Evans, J.S., Fnais, M., Giannadaki, D. and Pozzer, A., 2015. The contribution of
outdoor air pollution sources to premature mortality on a global scale. Nature, 525(7569),
p.367.
Portier, C.J., Thigpen, T.K., Carter, S.R., Dilworth, C.H., Grambsch, A.E., Gohlke, J., Hess, J.,
Howard, S.N., Luber, G., Lutz, J.T. and Maslak, T., 2017. A human health perspective on
climate change: A report outlining the research needs on the human health effects of
climate change. Environmental Health Perspectives/National Institute of Environmental
Health Sciences.
Prüss-Üstün, A., Wolf, J., Corvalán, C., Bos, R. and Neira, M., 2016. Preventing disease
through healthy environments: a global assessment of the burden of disease from
environmental risks. World Health Organization.

5
COMMON GOOD
Watts, N., Adger, W.N., Agnolucci, P., Blackstock, J., Byass, P., Cai, W., Chaytor, S., Colbourn,
T., Collins, M., Cooper, A. and Cox, P.M., 2015. Health and climate change: policy
responses to protect public health. The Lancet, 386(10006), pp.1861-1914.