Legal implications of the climate-health crisis: A case study analysis of the role of public health in climate litigation

Additional to an increasing trend in cases, we noted explicit references to climate change became notably more frequent in the post-2000 cases. In the 1990–99 cases, climate change was seldom explicitly mentioned as the core issue, and legal arguments primarily related to broader (though inherently climate-linked) issues of environmental harm and destruction, air and water pollution, and land-use change, amongst others. Anthropocentric conceptualiza- tions of the environment as a human-serving/resource-producing asset were also notably more apparent in the 1990–99 cases. In contrast, post-2000 cases featured far more explicit references to climate change. Not only were allegations grounded in an explicit focus on climate change, but many cases, particu- larly in more recent years linked human rights (including the right to health) with de- Fig 1. Total number of climate litigation cases by time period (1990–2020). https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0268633.g001 Fig 2. Distribution of non-USA climate litigation by World Bank development category. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0268633.g002 PLOS ONE Public health as a legal tool in climate litigation PLOS ONE | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0268633 June 15, 2022 9 / 31