Planetary Health is a solution oriented transdisciplinary field and a global movement focused on analyzing and addressing the impacts of human disruptions to Earth’s natural systems on human health and all life on Earth. A core insight of the field is that the current Earth crisis is so extensive that it is now driving a global humanitarian crisis (Planetary Health Alliance © 2022). The nature of our current problems, with global and local implications, requires that voices from all geographies, genders, and cultures be heard, and that those people be involved in the Planetary Health Alliance (PHA). With that in mind, the PHA proposed that the 4th Planetary Health Annual Meeting (PHAM2021) would be hosted for the first time in the Global South. After a selection process, the University of São Paulo (USP) was chosen to host the PHAM2021, in the city of São Paulo, Brazil. USP and PHA worked together to develop the program. The meeting motto reflects the overall concept: Planetary Health for all - bridging communities to achieve the Great Transition. Also on our minds was a sense of urgency to promote actions, as the Earth crisis continues to intensify all around the globe. Then came the COVID-19 outbreak to emphasize the importance of spreading the word about PH as a comprehensive framework to understand our current situation and to promote change. Intended to be held in-person at the USP main campus, we had to shift to a virtual meeting due to the pandemic. We took that as an opportunity to expand the program across an entire week, to declare the last week of April Planetary Health Week, and call our event PH Meeting and Festival, including arts sessions in the program, as arts are an important way to connect people around PH. Our audience increased tremendously, while lowering our environmental footprint: we had more than 5,000 registrants from 130 countries. The narrative of the event was especially tailored to be aligned with the underlying event concept, bringing foundations of PH - values and knowledge, and PH in action in the private sector, government and civil society. Each of them was the main theme of a day that week. Finally, we felt it was time for the global PH community to issue a call-to-action for a deep change and urgent response: the São Paulo Declaration on Planetary Health was developed openly and collaboratively by the global community with assistance from the United Nations Development Program and was released after the event. At the end, and after all the hard work, we felt very satisfied with the results, the ample participation, and with an innovative event that will certainly inspire the next editions.

This book has three main goals. The first is to celebrate the work of a great public health figure, the late A.J. (Tony) McMichael (1942–2014). The second is to position contemporary public health issues in an interdisciplinary context and in ways that highlight the interdependency between the environment, human institutions and behaviours; a broad approach championed by Tony. The third is to encourage emerging and future public health leaders to advocate for policies and cultural change to sustain and improve human health, from a foundation of objective scholarship. The book’s foreword and 38 chapters were written by people who were inspired by Tony; many of whom worked with him at some point in the last 40 years. Its structure reflects five major public health domains, each of which Tony made major contributions to in an extremely productive academic life: occupational health and safety; environmental and social epidemiology; nutrition and food systems; climate change and health; and ecosystem change and infectious disease. The final section, ‘Transformation’, is dedicated to Tony’s desire for public health scientists to propose adaptive and mitigating solutions to the problems they were observing. Each section contains at least one key publication involving Tony. There is also a selection of artworks from an exhibition which formed part of the conference held to honour Tony at The Australian National University in 2012. This conference formed the first part of Tony’s festschrift, completed by this book.

Longlisted for the 2021 Porchlight Business Book Awards, Big Ideas & New Perspectives “She offers something both broad and scarce: a compelling new story about how to create a desirable future.”—New York Times An award-winning author and leading international economist delivers a hard-hitting and much needed critique of modern capitalism in which she argues that, to solve the massive crises facing us, we must be innovative—we must use collaborative, mission-oriented thinking while also bringing a stakeholder view of public private partnerships which means not only taking risks together but also sharing the rewards. Capitalism is in crisis. The rich have gotten richer—the 1 percent, those with more than $1 million, own 44 percent of the world's wealth—while climate change is transforming—and in some cases wiping out—life on the planet. We are plagued by crises threatening our lives, and this situation is unsustainable. But how do we fix these problems decades in the making? Mission Economy looks at the grand challenges facing us in a radically new way. Global warming, pollution, dementia, obesity, gun violence, mobility—these environmental, health, and social dilemmas are huge, complex, and have no simple solutions. Mariana Mazzucato argues we need to think bigger and mobilize our resources in a way that is as bold as inspirational as the moon landing—this time to the most ‘wicked’ social problems of our time.. We can only begin to find answers if we fundamentally restructure capitalism to make it inclusive, sustainable, and driven by innovation that tackles concrete problems from the digital divide, to health pandemics, to our polluted cities. That means changing government tools and culture, creating new markers of corporate governance, and ensuring that corporations, society, and the government coalesce to share a common goal. We did it to go to the moon. We can do it again to fix our problems and improve the lives of every one of us. We simply can no longer afford not to.

A strikingly original exploration of what it might mean to be authentically human in the age of artificial intelligence, from the author of the critically-acclaimed Interior States. • "At times personal, at times philosophical, with a bracing mixture of openness and skepticism, it speaks thoughtfully and articulately to the most crucial issues awaiting our future." —Phillip Lopate “[A] truly fantastic book.”—Ezra Klein For most of human history the world was a magical and enchanted place ruled by forces beyond our understanding. The rise of science and Descartes's division of mind from world made materialism our ruling paradigm, in the process asking whether our own consciousness—i.e., souls—might be illusions. Now the inexorable rise of technology, with artificial intelligences that surpass our comprehension and control, and the spread of digital metaphors for self-understanding, the core questions of existence—identity, knowledge, the very nature and purpose of life itself—urgently require rethinking. Meghan O'Gieblyn tackles this challenge with philosophical rigor, intellectual reach, essayistic verve, refreshing originality, and an ironic sense of contradiction. She draws deeply and sometimes humorously from her own personal experience as a formerly religious believer still haunted by questions of faith, and she serves as the best possible guide to navigating the territory we are all entering.

An assessment of the impact of global warming on human health cites spiraling rates of disease and heatstroke-related deaths and outlines a blueprint for protecting oneself from environment-related health challenges.

The book draws upon the expertise and international research collaborations forged by the Worldwide Universities Network Global Africa Group to critically engage with the intersection, in theory and practice, of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Africa’s development agendas and needs. Further, it argues that – and demonstrates how – the SDGs should be understood as an aspirational blueprint for development with multiple meanings that are situated in dynamic and contested terrains. As the SDGs have substantial implications for development policy and resourcing at both the macro and micro levels, their relevance is not only context-specific but should also be assessed in terms of the aspirations and needs of ordinary citizens across the continent. Drawing on analyses and evidence from both the natural and social sciences, the book demonstrates that progress towards the SDGs must meet demands for improving human well-being under diverse and challenging socio-economic, political and environmental conditions. Examples include those from the mining industry, public health, employment and the media. In closing, it highlights how international collaboration in the form of research networks can enhance the production of critical knowledge on and engagement with the SDGs in Africa.