Founder Dr. Melissa Lem highlighted nature prescribing and INPA as key planetary health solutions
This fall saw INPA make its debut on the world stage at New York Climate Week. In advance of its official launch in October 2026, INPA’s Founder, Dr. Melissa Lem, was invited by the Planetary Guardians* to join them for multiple events and activations centred around the release of the 2026 Planetary Health Check Report, to share her work on nature prescribing with visitors from across the planet.
From interviews with influencers, to conversations during meals and receptions with the Guardians, to interactive, multimedia resources and a Solutions Panel featured in the Guardians’ pop-up Planetary Treatment Center near Grand Central Station, there were many opportunities to amplify the work of nature prescribing to improve community and planetary health worldwide.
Dr. Lem was proud to share the story of how she co-founded PaRx, Canada’s national nature prescription program, with BC Parks Foundation—which has now registered over 22,000 health professionals collectively issuing over 2 million prescriptions for nature to people in Canada to date, improving mental and physical health and shifting values in favour of biodiversity conservation—and describe next steps for the nature prescribing movement globally.
The Planetary Guardians and Dr. Lem left New York Climate Week with a promise to continue to collaborate to advance science and practice at the intersection of nature and human health in the months and years to come.
The Planetary Guardians are an independent, global collective of world-leading scientists, Indigenous leaders, former heads of state, and public figures chaired by Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim and including environmentalists like Dr. David Suzuki, Christiana Figueres and Dr. Sylvia Earle, who work to elevate the science to make Dr. Johan Rockström’s Planetary Boundaries a measurement framework for the world protect Earth’s life-support systems.