An international project funded by WHO
- Duration : 1 year (November 2024 – November 2025)
- Coordinated by : Université Libre de Bruxelles (Pr. Marie-Geneviève Pinsart & Virginie Pirard)
- Consortium : MNCB, ULiège, UMons, NCB, WIU, UAO, BBS
CONTEXT
Climate change represents an unprecedented threat to global health, already impacting individuals and populations in various and dramatic ways (droughts, floods, rising sea levels, increase of vector-borne diseases…). Strikingly, Climate Change is not only impacting us today but will also affect the generations to come, underlining the ethical link between our actions today and their potential consequences tomorrow.
Despite a fragmented and polarized international context, global efforts to respond to Climate Change are ongoing as illustrated by the inclusion of the Climate change response into the six WHO strategic objectives for 2025-2028 (77th World Health Assembly, May-June 2024).
As key regulators of the research ecosystem and as independent advisory bodies at a national level in more than two-thirds of the U.N. Countries, existing national ethics committees (NECs) and research ethics committees (RECs) must be embedded into this strategy.
This is why the WHO has committed to drafting new ethics guidelines which will incorporate the ethical management of climate change issues in health research, within their broader work programme which aims to promote ethically sound and equitable climate and health research.
Leading an international & outstanding consortium of 8 partners (NECs, RECs and other Ethics bodies from 4 continents), Université Libre de Bruxelles as coordinator (co lead: Marie Geneviève Pinsart and Virginie Pirard) has been selected by WHO to work on these future ethics guidelines based on their R(H)OPE project which focuses on exploring the ‘right to an Open future’.
WORK PROGRAMME
This 1-year collaborative project aims to provide Ethics Committees (RECs, NECs) with tailored tools to address the impacts of climate change on health and guide ethical decision-making in governance. It is structured around the following key activities, undertaken collaboratively by an international consortium, coordinated by ULB:
Identifying and discussing key concepts and ethical challenges – including Mental Health impacts – specific to the context of each partner (4 involved continents),
Analysing past practices of ethics committees and the normative frameworks they have utilized, providing insights into existing standards and opportunities for improvement.
Developing detailed case studies based on local expertise and experiences in regions most affected by the impact of climate change
Formulating recommendations to establish a comprehensive framework, enabling ethics committees to effectively address climate-related health challenges and promote sustainable practices based on the right to an Open Future.
The final results of R(H)OPE will be published in an open-access journal, at the end of the project.
CONSORTIUM
The consortium brings together experienced ethicists, researchers, members of Research and National Ethics Committees as well as National Bioethics Boards and societies from four continents, driven by their shared commitment to addressing major concerns about climate change and health.