[Peakoil] Peak Oil and health care article from Australian Nursing Journal

Wed May 25 02:04:41 UTC 2011

Someone is paying attention!

Alex

---------------------------- Original Message ----------------------------
Subject: [roeoz] PEAK OIL AND HEALTH CARE WITHOUT PLASTIC from Australian
Nursing Journal
From:    "Michael Lardelli" <michael.lardelli at adelaide.edu.au>
Date:    Wed, May 25, 2011 11:26
To:      roeoz at yahoogroups.com
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Someone mentioned this earlier. Here is the text of the article.
_______________________________________________

PEAK OIL AND HEALTH CARE WITHOUT PLASTIC
Johnstone, Megan-Jane
Australian Nursing Journal; ANJ
05-01-2011

In September 2000, an acute fuel shortage across Britain brought the nation
to a standstill in just seven days. The crisis came about after fishermen,
farmers and truck drivers formed a blockade to protest the rising price of
fuel. As a result of the blockade, supplies of petrol and diesel were unable
to get from the refineries to petrol stations. Significantly, one of the
most severely affected sectors of the community was health care. Problems
reported by the media included:

* Inability to discharge patients because their relatives could not travel
to the hospital to pick them up.

* Closure of outpatients departments.

* Severe shortages of blood products, drugs, sutures and linen.

* Cancellation of all elective and non-emergency surgery.

* Shortages of hospital staff because they could not getto work.

* Severe limitation of ambulance travel, with activity limited to emergency
calls only.

* Inability of community nurses, general practitioners and other
community-based workers to visit their patients.

* Accumulation of contaminated waste because it could not be collected
(Barson and Roth, 2006, p. 21).

The UK experience clearly demonstrated that oil shortages (even temporary
ones) can be extremely disruptive and disabling to a country's health care
system. It also served as a potent reminder of the need to consider more
seriously the otherwise largely ignored issue of 'peak oil' (also termed
'peak petroleum') and the future ethical challenges this stands to pose for
health care providers.

Peak oil refers to the point at which petroleum production reaches its
maximum. Critics contest that peak oil may already have occurred (2010) or
will not occur until well after 2030; many concur that oil production will
probably peak in 2020. After this date, oil supplies are expected to decline
irrevocably. It is predicted that the consequences of peak oil for public
health and for the world's health care systems will be dire (Frumkin et al
2009).

In the UK case, it was the impact of the oil shortage on transportation that
primarily led to the country's health care system being so severely
affected. Oil scarcity, however, has the capacity to affect the health care
system in other deeply challenging and ethically troubling ways. As has been
well documented, oil shortages can lead to serious shortfalls in medical
supplies and equipment, and energy generation, raising critical questions
about a society's obligation to ration scarce resources and the related
quandary of: Who gets what, when, why and at whose expense?

What is often not appreciated, both by the public and health care providers,
is that many common drugs (eg aspirin, antibiotics, antihistamines and
antineoplastics) and other medicinal products (eg lubricants, gels and
antiseptic soaps) are made from petroleum derivatives. The often taken for
granted supplies of plastic gloves, syringes, infusion sets, suction tubing,
drains, oxygen masks, airways, rubbish disposal bags, and other 'medical
plastics', all of which have become essential to the provision of aseptic
care, are also made from oil (Clark and Kline 1981; Frumkin et al 2009). A
shortage of oil therefore could lead to a serious shortfall in a whole range
of products that are essential to the provision of safe, effective and
affordable health care.

A question of nursing ethics

Australia's health care system is so utterly dependent on oil that it would
probably "cease to function effectively once peak oil occurs and petroleum
products become scarcer and more expensive" (Barson and Roth 2006, p. 3).
Despite this known dependency, the moral implications of peak oil for health
care in general and for nursing services in particular are rarely talked
about. Thus it is doubtful that the nursing profession is as prepared as it
needs to be for the ethical challenges of peak oil, raising important
questions about what processes need to be progressed in order to ensure that
the profession is adequately prepared.

Nurses and peak oil preparedness

There are currently no formal nursing organisation position statements or
ethics guidelines concerning nurses and peak oil preparedness. Although
nursing organisations (including the International Council of Nurses) have
position statements on 'Nurses and disaster preparedness', these statements
tend to have as their focus large-scale natural disasters such as floods,
earthquakes, droughts and volcanic eruptions, not 'the long emergency' of
peak oil. Moreover, although these statements position national nursing
associations as having a vital role to play in disaster prevention,
mitigation, preparedness, and relief, the statements in question are not
readily applicable to the ethically challenging scenarios posed by peak oil.

The ethical consequences to nursing of peak petroleum are likely to be
incremental, rather than sudden. Even so, without forward planning
encompassing a comprehensive oil vulnerability analysis, nurses will not be
well placed to prepare for or mitigate the tough ethical challenges and
choices that lay ahead. Of particular concern will be the ethics of
rationing care and practicing altered standards of care as 'single use' and
disposable plastic items dwindle in supply.

Being ethical in extreme situations can be particularly challenging because
it may not be clear what the right thing to do is. Considering ethical
quandaries associated with peak oil in advance will help mitigate this
difficulty. Identifying the oil-dependent vulnerabilities in the health care
system and in nursing practice would be an appropriate place to start.
Another might be exploring how nurses might champion the ethical
preservation and use of medical plastics. One thing that is clear: the
status quo is not an option.
REFERENCE
REFERENCES

Barson, J. and Roth, P. 2006. Supplementary submission to the Senate Inquiry
into Australia's Future Oil Supply. ASPO-Australia Health Sector Working
Group. http://www.aph.gov.au/senate/committee/rrat_ctte/
completed_inquiries/2004-07/oil_supply/submissions/subi38a. pdf [accessed 21
February, 2011]

Clark, G. and Kline, B. 1981. Impact of oil shortage on plastic medical
supplies. Public Health Reports, 96(2):111-115.

Frumkin, H., Hess, J. and Vindigni, S. 2009. Energy and public health: The
challenges of peak petroleum. Public Health Reports, 124: 5-19.
AUTHOR_AFFILIATION
MEGAN-JANE JOHNSTONE IS PROFESSOR OF NURSING IN THE SCHOOL OF NURSING AND
MIDWIFERY AT DEAKIN UNIVERSITY IN VICTORIA. PROFESSOR JOHNSTONE HAS
EXTENSIVE INTEREST AND EXPERTISE IN THE AREA OF PROFESSIONAL ETHICS IN
NURSING.
PEAK OIL AND HEALTH CARE WITHOUT PLASTIC

Byline: Johnstone, Megan-Jane
Volume: 18
Number: 10
ISSN: 13203185
Publication Date: 05-01-2011
Page: 29
Section: ethics
Type: Periodical
Language: English

Copyright Australian Nurses Federation May 2011