Can we have a sustainable health system?

Having established the long arc of history to get to this point in the climate emergency, this chapter presents information in two distinct ways to address an overarching question which we pose in this book: can we have a sustainable health system? Rather than answer this with a single human author, or a team, one of the editors interrogated ChatGPT, a machine-based natural processing tool, and provided a narrative to round out ChatGPT’s response. Five sections comprise the chapter: a direct answer to the question whether we have a sustainable health system; a response to healthcare’s bidirectional problem of healthcare as a major emitter of greenhouse gases and as a provider of care in a climate-changed world; the extent which healthcare systems can reach their potential in this angst-ridden world; a commentary on a ChatGPT poem about how health systems can cope in a climate-affected planet; and the extent to which people will benefit if health system succeeds in meeting these challenges.