Paper short abstract:

The paper focuses at the interface of planet health and sustainability to intellectually process the relationships between health and development in the times of climate-induced changes in our diverse realities.

Paper long abstract:

The paper is an attempt to theoretically advance the relationship between health and sustainable development. The discourse of development has been shaping the discipline as well as practice of public health since its inception. Thus public health has been largely conceptualised in development studies as population health in order to be a part of a comprehensive human development index. In the aftermath of COVID 19 pandemic and in the light of growing climate adversities, the significance of planetary health (consisting both human and ecosystem health) in the development studies is indicative. The notion of a productive body for human development is now altered with the vision of safeguarding the interests of human and ecosystem health for sustainable ecosystem services. It is thus imperative to analyse whether this change is meta-physical or meta-semiotic in the construction of knowledge systems wherein both planetary health and sustainable development are claimed to complement each other. How does this new construction shape the processes of techno-scientific as well as calculative exercises while determining methodological choices? Is it possible to foster a practical definition coming out of these two distinct yet interrelated 'ideas' to address the challenges on social, political, economic and ecological fronts? The paper tracks these provocative questions by problematising the real-world complexities accelerated by anthropogenic activities, and aspire to develop a framework for inquiries on health and sustainability in the development studies.