EDITORIAL - Shape our future

All pandemics end; the COVID-19 pestilence will be no different. What will continue to pose an existential threat to the planet, long after the pandemic is over, is climate change.

Collective action is needed to confront this threat. Today the world will reaffirm its commitment to such action, through the symbolic switching off for an hour of lights and devices that consume electricity. The Philippines is joining Earth Hour 2022 tonight from 8:30 to 9:30.

From a symbolic lights-out event in Sydney, Australia in 2007, Earth Hour has grown into a global initiative, with 192 countries and territories participating last year as COVID rampaged across the planet.

The pandemic itself has highlighted the importance of protecting the environment, biodiversity and wildlife. Scientists believe the COVID-causing coronavirus jumped to humans in late 2019 from bats, with civet cats and pangolins as possible intermediaries. The animals were sold for food and traditional medicine in a wildlife market in China’s Wuhan City. The market has since been shut down.

It remains to be seen whether the nearly 500 million infections and over 6.11 million deaths so far from COVID have significantly dampened the appetite for bats and civets. This month China locked down entire cities and large areas of its key urban centers because of its worst COVID outbreak since the early days of the pandemic, driven by the Omicron variant.

The message sent by participants in Earth Hour goes beyond an hour of switching off lights. Legislation and executive policies have been crafted as a result of heightened awareness about the need to confront climate change. The annual observance of Earth Hour has shown the impact of united action in shaping the future of the planet. With collective action, that future can be bright.