Advancing an environmentally responsible physiotherapy

 

The world faces complex and interrelated crises… Climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution, rapid urbanization, geopolitical conflict and militarization, demographic change, population displacement, poverty, and widespread inequity create risks of future crises even more severe than those experienced today. Responses require investments that integrate planetary, societal, community and individual health and well-being (WHO 2021 Geneva Charter for Wellbeing)

 

 The impact of human activities on our planet’s natural systems has been intensifying rapidly in the past several decades, leading to disruption and transformation of most natural systems. These disruptions in the atmosphere, oceans, and across the terrestrial land surface are not only driving species to extinction, they pose serious threats to human health and wellbeing. Characterising and addressing these threats requires a paradigm shift (Myers, 2017)

Action at the level of direct drivers of nature decline, although necessary, is not sufficient … a sustainable global future’ is ‘only possible with urgent transformative change that tackles the root causes: the interconnected economic, socio-cultural, demographic, political, institutional, and technological indirect drivers behind the direct drivers (Diaz et al., 2019)

About

An international community of academics, clinicians, practitioners and students interested in exploring and advancing the field of environmental physiotherapy. 

Blog

Follow our latest musings on environmental physiotherapy. Ideas, inspiration, news, publications, events, and more. 

Join

Become part of the first international community of physiotherapists with an interest in researching, developing, and practising physiotherapy at a planetary scale. 

Resources

A growing selection of resources carefully selected by members of the EPA to inspire your thinking and practice of environmental physiotherapy. 

Et si promouvoir l’activité physique devenait un levier de santé durable ?

Face à l’urgence climatique et aux inégalités sociales croissantes, les professionnel·les de la santé et du social se retrouvent à un carrefour décisif : comment soigner les populations humaines tout en prenant soin de la planète, qui elle-même influence notre santé ?...

World Physiotherapy Congress 2021 – The inofficial environmental physiotherapy stream

Shortly after the launch of the Environmental Physiotherapy Association in the middle of 2019 I put out what felt like a wish to the universe (in blogpost format) hoping for people to submit their interest in environmental and sustainability related topics to be...

Environmental physiotherapy meets critical physiotherapy meets Latin America

Toward the end of last year, an incredibly inspiring and creative meeting took place amongst physiotherapists in Latin America.  Though it was the first Latin-American meeting of the Critical Physiotherapy Network (CPN), it was a place and occasion that explored the...

The EPA celebrates it’s first anniversary

I am finding it really hard to believe, but it is one year to the day since we have launched the Environmental Physiotherapy Association and so much has happened in so little time. Evidently, the COVID-19 pandemic has overshadowed the last six months of this time, but...

If you have any thoughts, ideas or questions about environmental physiotherapy,
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