The global Covid-19 pandemic can in many ways be compared to climate change after pushing the “fast forward” button. It has had an enormous impact on virtually everybody’s health, well-being, and in many cases on their financial and labour market prospects as well However, the younger generation is particularly adversely affected by these developments. Covid-19 has made it clear how quickly and how comprehensively a global crisis can affect all of our lives, penetrating deeply into the private sphere. Are there lessons to be learned from this global crisis?

The Covid-19 crisis impressively shows how much our fight against it depends on solidarity on all levels of society. The global pandemic, like the climate catastrophe, does not stop at national borders.

Health and environmental crises hit the most vulnerable members of our societies particularly hard. What can we do to encourage more solidarity among all ages, all sectors, and all countries to tackle the arguably even more serious long-term crisis of climate change?

The United Nations Development Program’s “Peoples’ Climate Vote” conducted by the University of Oxford reflects the opinions of over half of the world’s population. Sixty-four percent of people believe climate change is a global emergency, despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. When it comes to age, younger people (under 18) were more likely to say climate change is an emergency than older people. Nevertheless, other age groups were not far behind, illustrating how widely held this view has become.