COVID-19: Lessons for the climate change emergency

Abstract

The ongoing COVID-19 outbreak pandemic is now a global crisis. It has caused 9+ million confirmed cases and 400,000+ deaths at the time of writing and triggered unprecedented preventative measures that have confined a substantial portion of the global population and established 'social distancing' as a new global behavioral norm. The COVID-19 crisis has affected all aspects of everyday life and work, and heavily impacted the global economy. This crisis also offers unprecedented insights into how the global climate crisis may be managed, as there are many parallels between the COVID-19 crisis and what we expect from the imminent global climate emergency. Reflecting upon the challenges of today's crisis may help us better prepare for the future. Here we compile a list, by no means comprehensive, of the similarities and differences between the two crises, and the lessons we can learn from them: (i) High momentum trends, (ii) Irreversible changes, (iii) Social and spatial inequality, (iv) Weakening of international solidarity, and (v) Less costly to prevent than to cure.

Keywords: COVID-19; Climate change; Climate emergency.

Graphical abstract

Fig. 1

Hypothetical social and economic impacts of the COVID-19 and climate crises in the presence and absence of preventative measures. Note the different timescales. a) Reduction of the social impact (as burden on the healthcare system) associated with ‘flatten the curve’ strategies. Early preventative measures, such as lockdowns or quarantine, can have a high initial social cost. b) Early action can also have a high initial impact but reduce the long-term economic impact, while inaction may cost less in the short-term but have greater long-term impact. c) Early action may entail higher social costs due to lifestyle and employment change and economic transition (e.g. to new energies, re-building infrastructure) but will prevent the large social costs of extreme events, water shortages, conflicts, etc. d) Economic investment in climate change prevention has a high initial impact but helps to avoid the worst long-term economic damage. In contrast, climate change inaction can have unimaginably high economic costs in the long term. Uncertainties are highlighted as shaded areas around the curves.