A Closer Look

Panel 1: Healthcare Sector Safe and Just Operating Space

This panel will explore healthcare ecological economics including concepts of sufficiency, decent living standards, and how society can support a good life for all. We will apply these notions to the healthcare sector, which is presently exceeding planetary boundaries while simultaneously failing to meet health needs. How do we begin to define minimum standards that reflect universal access to quality healthcare, and what sort of systemic transformation is required to achieve these standards without exceeding fair and sustainable levels of resource consumption and pollution? How should principles of distributive justice guide global health action toward universal healthcare goals?

Speakers:

• Andrew Fanning, PhD, Research and Data Analysis Lead, Doughnut Economics Action Lab

• Martin Hensher, PhD, MSc(Econ), Henry Baldwin Professorial Research Fellow in Health Systems Sustainability, Menzies Institute for Medical Research, University of Tasmania

• Narasimha Rao, PhD, Professor of Energy Systems, Yale School of the Environment; Senior Research Scholar, International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis

Moderator:

• Andrea MacNeill, MD, MSc, FRCSC, Associate Professor of Surgery and Director, Planetary Healthcare Lab, University of British Columbia; Co-chair, Lancet Commission on Sustainable Healthcare

Panel 2: Achieving Sustainable, High Quality Healthcare Systems

Inappropriate, low value care is a global issue across high- and low-resourced settings. It harms health directly and indirectly, through avoidable iatrogenic injuries and patient suffering, healthcare pollution-related diseases, and inappropriate resource consumption limiting equitable care access. Value-based payment reform has been touted as a strategy to reduce harm, waste, and costs of healthcare. Can we incentivize environmentally sustainable care, and if so, how? What is sustainable, high quality health care, and how do we know? Speakers will present experiences with measuring and incentivizing performance improvement across settings, discuss potential policy reforms, and implications of the current U.S. administration on efforts to achieve sustainable healthcare transformation. 

Speakers:

• David Himmelstein, MD, Distinguished Professor of Public Health, City University of New York, Hunter College; Lecturer in Medicine, Harvard Medical School

• Margaret E. Kruk, MD, MPH, Director, QuEST Center; Distinguished Professor of Health Systems and Medicine, Division of General Medicine and Geriatrics, Department of Medicine, Washington University School of Medicine

• Thomas Leyden, MBA, Director, Value Partnerships Programs, Blue Cross Blue Shield Michigan

• Andrew M. Ryan, PhD, Professor of Health Services, Policy, and Practice, Brown University School of Public Health; Founding Director, Center for Advancing the Study of Healthcare, Brown University

Moderator:

• Jodi Sherman, MD, Director, Yale Program on Healthcare Environmental Sustainability

Panel 3: Healthcare System Pollution Mitigation and Prevention Across Settings

Health systems spanning academic medical centers and rural clinics, and across income settings, are successfully implementing carbon measurement and mitigation, as well as disease prevention strategies. How are they collecting and analyzing data to guide evidence-based solutions and track improvement? What interventions are feasible and high impact? What barriers have they encountered, and what lessons have they learned to overcome them? Hear from leading experts innovating in clinical care quality, facility energy, supply chain, and waste management, as well as city-level policy solutions.

Speakers:

• Komal Bajaj, MD, MS-HPEd, Medical Director of Sustainability, NYC Health + Hospitals; Chief Quality Officer, NYC Health + Hospitals/Jacobi/NCB

• Lisa Patel, MD, MESc, FAAP, Executive Director, Medical Society Consortium on Climate and Health

• Fawzia Rasheed, PhD, Climate and Environment Lead, Aga Khan Health Services; Professor, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; Member, Lancet Commission of Sustainable Healthcare

• Chris Webb, MEng, Group Head of Climate and Nature, Bupa

Moderator:

• Joe Bialowitz, Ms, MSc, Associate Director, Sustainability, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center

Author Lunch and Fireside Chat with Kate Marvel, PhD

An informal yet intellectually rich dialogue with Climate Scientist and Science Communicator Kate Marvel, PHD, Author of Human Nature: Nine Ways to Feel About our Changing Planet

Moderator:

• Rebecca Weston, JD, CSW, Co-Executive Director, Climate Psychology Alliance

Panel 4: Balancing Healthcare System Resilience, Pollution Mitigation, and Equity

Some methods to reduce healthcare system vulnerability and pollution are synergistic, while others are at odds. How should, pharmacists, care providers, procurement officers, administrators, policy makers, and industry leaders prioritize actions that maximize resilience and minimize pollution, while also advancing health equity? Speakers will share innovative approaches across various settings and scales, highlighting experiences from low-resourced rural and high-resourced urban health centers, as well as displaced populations. 

Speakers:

• Özlem Ergun, PhD, Distinguished Professor of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, Northeastern University

• Nishaminy Kasbekar, BS, PharmD, CPEL, FASHP, Vice President and Chief Pharmacy Officer, University of Pennsylvania Health System

• Jenny McColloch, MBA, MS, Vice President of Sustainability and Community Impact, CVS Health

• Madhury Ray, MD MPH CEM, Paul Farmer Fellow in Anti-Racism and Preventive Medicine, NYC Health Department; Visiting Scientist, Yale Humanitarian Research Laboratory

Moderator:

• Iris Blom, MD, PhD, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine; Lancet Commission on Sustainable Healthcare

⭐ LAUNCH Panel 5: State Scorecard on Climate, Health, and Health Care ⭐

This exciting panel marks the official launch of The Commonwealth Fund State Scorecard on Climate, Health and Health Care—a groundbreaking addition to the annual Scorecard on State Health System Performance that evaluates how U.S. states are aligning healthcare systems with climate and environmental goals and assesses how people and healthcare systems in each state are vulnerable to climate and environmental factors.

The scorecard emphasizes the intertwined relationship between the health sector and the environment, examining how healthcare systems can address the impacts of climate change and mitigate their own environmental footprint, as well as highlighting opportunities for states to promote population health through policies that foster a healthier environment.

Panelists will unveil key findings, present innovative policy examples, and discuss how this scorecard can drive accountability and policy action across sectors to advance population health and low-polluting, resilient healthcare systems nationwide.

Speakers:

• Paul Biddinger, MD, Chief Preparedness and Continuity Officer, Mass General Brigham

• Manisha Juthani, MD, Commissioner, Connecticut Department of Public Health; Adjunct Professor, Yale School of Medicine

• Melanie Marino, PhD candidate, Civil and Environmental Engineering, Northeastern University

• Umair Shah, MD, MPH, Founder & CEO, Rickshaw Health; Adjunct Faculty, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health; Former Secretary of Health, Washington State

• Ashwin Vasan, MD, PhD, Senior Fellow, Health Policy and Global Affairs, Yale School of Public Health; Healthcare Advisor, Commonweal Ventures

Moderator:

• Matthew Eckelman, PhD, Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Northeastern University

Fireside Chat with Kim Stanley Robinson

Our second fireside chat is with acclaimed science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson, author of Ministry of the Future.

Moderator:

• Maya Prabhu, MD, LLB, Associate Professor, Yale School of Medicine; Associate Professor (Adjunct) of Law at Yale Law School; Associate Professor of the Environment (Courtesy)