Najam Speaks at MSF Scientific Days South Asia

Adil Najam, Dean of the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, gave the keynote address at the Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctor’s Without Borders) MSF Scientific Days South Asia 2017: A Conference Without Borders on May 27, 2017.

The MSF Scientific Days South Asia is aimed at promoting the effective sharing of relevant scientific research will contribute to the further improvement of MSF’s care in this region. Research and innovation from the frontline of humanitarian action is presented and debated, and is streamed live and free online to a global audience.

Najam’s keynote, entitled “Climate Change and Public Health: The Coming Crises” focused on how we now live in the Age of Adaptation. He argued that this does not mean that mitigation is no longer important, but that climate impacts are now a reality of today — not a possibility for tomorrow. There is a new urgency, and climate impacts are exacerbating all the crises we have been dealing with forever, according to Najam.

Mitigation is really about carbon management, which means that it is primarily about energy management, according to Najam. However, adaptation cannot be done by carbon management — impacts are mostly about water, which is where the focus of much of our future will be, Najam said.

According to Najam, the poor will be negatively impacted the most in the Age of Adaptation because they live the most marginally and are the most vulnerable. Najam argued that this has two implications — that climate has to be seen as a development issue, and that climate has to be seen as a justice issue.

Adil Najam is the inaugural dean of the Pardee School and a professor of international relations and also of earth and environment at Boston University. His research focuses on issues of global public policy, especially those related to global climate change, South Asia, Muslim countries, environment and development, and human development. Najam was a co-author for the Third and Fourth Assessments of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC); work for which the scientific panel was awarded the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for advancing the public understanding of climate change science.