As Greta Thunberg argues, we have failed to empathize with our own great-grandchildren and the world of disease, drought, storms, floods, wildfire, mass migration, political instability and war that awaits them.TROY FLEECE / Regina Leader-Post

Be kind, be calm, be safe. Dr. Bonnie Henry

The evidence is overwhelming. The best strategy for beating COVID-19 is to combine good science with kindness. Now the same combination is needed to stop climate change.

B.C. has one of the best records in the world fighting COVID largely because provincial health officer Dr. Bonnie Henry delivered scientific facts along with relentless reminders to be thoughtful of others.

In sharp contrast, the U.S. has the most COVID-19 cases and deaths in the world largely because President Donald Trump denied the science and urged Americans to nurse grievance and abandon empathy. Tens of thousands will now die because the inconvenience of mask-wearing is deemed more important than the lives of neighbours.

It turns out that bad science and failure of empathy is a particularly lethal combination.

There is an important lesson here. In essence, we have failed to deal with climate change for the same reasons that the U.S. failed in dealing with COVID. We have failed to heed the consensus science predicting imminent climate catastrophe. And, as Greta Thunberg argues, we have failed to empathize with our own great-grandchildren and the world of disease, drought, storms, floods, wildfire, mass migration, political instability and war that awaits them. Our refusal to walk in their shoes is the moral failure of our age.

Hopefully,our pandemic experience could change all this.

First, the COVID experience should renew respect for good science. For over 30 years, fossil fuel corporate fog machines have run a disinformation campaign against inconvenient scientific facts and funded politicians to claim that climate change is another hoax. But the pandemic with its more immediate connection between actions and fatal consequence has vividly demonstrated the danger of substituting conspiracy theories and alternative facts for scientific fact.

As Angela Merkel recently stressed: You cannot fight a pandemic with lies and disinformation any more than you can fight it with hate.

Every day, principled scientists such as Dr. Anthony Fauci re-instil public trust in sound science. Soon, a successful race for a vaccine like the 1950s race for a polio vaccine and the 1960s space race should dramatically restore trust in science. And science clearly demands urgent action on climate change.

Perhaps more important, the pandemic has taught us the critical importance of kindness, of fellow-feeling, of community. There is a reason why Dr. Henrys first public health injunction is Be kind. We are all interconnected, and we have to think about others in order for the community to be healthy.

We may bridle at putting on a mask, but we now know that selfish actions in a pandemic can kill a neighbours grandfather, give a friend a stroke. Similarly, we may bridle at giving up air travel and reducing car use, but if we love future children, we must act on climate change.

Our sense of community and kindness has deteriorated, particularly in the U.S. shattered by decades of media that shifted the social paradigm from FDRs I am my brothers keeper to the Trumpian Every dog for itself. Rush Limbaugh, Survivor, The Apprentice and professional wrestling have taught that people are either winners or losers, and you must not be a loser. Kick others off the island before they kick you off.

But the pandemic has vividly demonstrated that the Golden Rule is a better approach. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you is superior social policy. We all win when we act on objective facts, and are kind to others including our imperilled grandchildren.

Calvin Sandborn teaches environmental law at the University of Victoria, and is the author of Becoming the Kind Father.

Letters to the editor should be sent to provletters@theprovince.com.

CLICK HEREto report a typo.

Is there more to this story? Wed like to hear from you about this or any other stories you think we should know about. Emailvantips@postmedia.com.

Originally posted here:

Calvin Sandborn: Lessons from the pandemic an approach to climate change - The Province