OPINION: Cli-Fi—Helping us Manage a Crisis

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BMJ · October 3, 2024

Authored by Howard Frumkin, Nature and Health co-founder and Steering Committee member

A Fire So Wild by Sarah Ruiz-Grossman is one of several cli-fi books mentioned in Frumkin’s opinion piece.

Reading fiction is one of the sublime ways to experience art. Stories engage us, absorb us, and stay with us.1 The reader may be transported cognitively and emotionally, and experience images more vivid than those in real life.2 This can be transformative; a compelling narrative may change a reader’s point of view.3 Fiction is “the mind’s flight simulator,” according to novelist and psychologist Keith Oatley,4 helping us understand both our own minds and the world’s complexity.

Indeed, stories are an integral part of all cultural traditions. “The human mind is a story processor, not a logic processor,” writes moral psychologist Jonathan Haidt.5 “Everyone loves a good story; every culture bathes its children in stories.” Stories shape collective memories, define social identity, and—importantly in the context of contemporary crises such as climate change—frame the possibilities people perceive for the future.

In recent years, the genre known as climate fiction—or “cli-fi”—has blossomed. “We decide what to do based on the stories we tell ourselves,” says Robinson, “so we very much need to be telling stories about our responses to climate change and the associated massive problems bearing down on us and our descendants.”6 Dozens of authors have answered the call.

Health Professionals and the Climate Crisis: Trusted Voices, Essential Roles

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By Edward Maibach, Howard Frumkin, Samantha Ahdoot · World Medical & Health Policy · March 3, 2021

Co-authored by Howard Frumkin, Nature and Health researcher and Steering Committee member

Climate change has triggered a global public health emergency that, unless adequately addressed, is likely to become a multigenerational public health catastrophe. The policy actions needed to limit global warming deliver a wide range of public health benefits above and beyond those that will result from limiting climate change. Moreover, these health benefits are immediate and local, addressing one of the most vexing challenges of climate solutions: that the benefits of greenhouse gas reduction are seen as long-term and global, which are remote from the concerns of many jurisdictions. In this commentary, we identify roles that health professionals and health organizations can play, individually and collectively, to advance equitable climate and health policies in their communities, health systems, states, and nations. Ultimately, health voices can work across national boundaries to influence the world’s commitments to the Paris Agreement, arguably the world’s most important public health goal.

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