Planetary Health: a public health answer to climate change and other Anthropocene challenges

Abstract Although in the last century, humanity achieved extraordinary outcomes in terms of health, social and economic improvements, the Earth ecosystems around us suffer of high levels of degradation. This issue poses our recent public health and development gains at risk. The Anthropocene, a new geological era we are living in since mid 20th century, is indeed characterized by humanity’s dramatic impact on Earth’s biophysical conditions. Planetary Health is a relatively new field, oriented to solutions, based on transdisciplinarity and social movement, focused on analyzing and addressing the impacts of human disruptions to Earth’s natural systems on human health and all life on Earth. In this presentation, a brief overview of the main issues related to the Anthropocene in the public health perspective will be provided and new tools for the analysis of planetary health challenges will be proposed, citing relevant case studies for discussion.