Our Declaration of a Climate Emergency
Our pledge
We at Helston Medical Centre are concerned about and recognise the importance and urgency of addressing climate change, and the serious risks that climate change poses for present and future generations.
We agree to take the following actions:
• We will tell the truth and acknowledge the climate crisis is a health crisis and an emergency.
• We are stronger together and will work with others; our staff, patients, healthcare colleagues and local communities, to create new solutions.
• We know that the climate crisis is also a health crisis, and we pledge to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions (carbon footprint) caused by our practice and aim for a Net Zero NHS.
You can read more here www.england.nhs.uk/greenernhs/
• To achieve the target of Net Zero, we plan to measure our carbon footprint, identify the hotspots and put plans into action to reduce each of these.
• We will pay attention to the climate footprint of our travel (both staff and patients), energy use, the services we use, and the products we buy and use. We will make low-carbon choices wherever possible. We will treat all the resources we use as valuable and not be wasteful.
• We will provide leadership through our actions and share our experiences in making cleaner choices with our staff, patients and colleagues and encourage them to sign their pledge too.
• We’ve achieved a lot already – working towards the RCGP/NUS Green Impact awards. We have reached the bronze award but there’s still lots we can do to reduce our carbon right down and make good choices.
We aim to:
- Improve our energy efficiency further
- Recycle everything we can and encourage patients to do the same
- Encourage both staff and patients to consider their travel choices
- Thinking about what we buy so we treat the planet and farmers more kindly
- Making sure we don’t waste anything, such as paper. Using electronic methods wherever possible.
- Making sure people only take the medication they need to feel better
- Helping our staff feel well
- Talk to patients about moving more to feel good.