Health professionals protested today outside JP Morgan Bank in St Peters Square to encourage employees to ‘raise the alarm’ about the climate crisis and shift company policy away from fossil fuel investment.
Health for Extinction Rebellion (HXR) are protesting JP Morgan’s continuing financing of the fossil fuel industry despite the significant negative impact on people’s physical and mental health – across the world, but with a disproportionately greater impact on poorer communities here and overseas and communities in the global south.
HXR has targeted JP Morgan since 2021 due to the bank’s high and continuing levels of fossil fuel financing to the tune of $434 billion since the Paris agreement of 2015 (the international agreement which aimed to limit greenhouse gas emissions).
JP Morgan is also the second biggest financier of oil and gas exploration in the Amazon which is the world’s largest carbon sink.
JP Morgan’s own business principles include “A Commitment To Integrity, Fairness and Responsibility”, stating that; ‘We face facts’ and ‘We help strengthen the communities in which we live and work.’
Yet their economists David Mackie and Jessica Murray admit in their paper, written in 2020, that the climate crisis will impact the world’s economy, human health, water stress, migration and the survival of other species on Earth. They state: “We cannot rule out catastrophic outcomes where human life as we know it is threatened”.
HXR’s focus today was to persuade JP Morgan employees to examine and influence company policy and culture from within. Employees have previously spoken ‘off record’ to voice their concerns about the climate crisis and fossil fuel investment so Health for Extinction Rebellion hope that appealing to employees’ consciences, encouraging them to find like minded colleagues and arming them with factual information can lead to genuine, significant cultural and policy changes at the bank
