Better decisions with better data
Health is a political choice. But these choices must be grounded in science and reliable data. Over recent decades, research has shown how deeply intertwined human well-being is with the environment: climate change, biodiversity loss, pollution, land and water use, food security, socio-economic actions, and other interlinked threats. Together, these represent the full spectrum of human-driven pressures on Earth that shape both ecological and human health. At a planetary scale, the health of people, animals and ecosystems is inseparable – bound together in complex, non-linear dynamics across societies, economies and nature.
Planetary health science has advanced the thinking by identifying nine planetary boundaries that define the safe operating space for humanity. Several of these boundaries have already been transgressed, while others are under critical pressure. Many pathways linking boundary transgressions to human health are well understood – through climate, water, food and disease – but further research is needed to uncover additional pathways quantify causal mechanisms, and assess distributional impacts across regions and populations. Only then can decision makers design effective interventions to optimise the trajectories forward.
This research is extraordinarily complex. Because interactions are nonlinear and global, they can only be understood in a unified framework – just as we all share one common planet.
A critical moment
Planetary health science now stands at a turning point. We have abundant global data and unprecedented computing power, yet our analytical tools lag behind. Traditional frameworks – disciplinary models or isolated studies – are too narrow to capture the web of interconnections between societies, economies and the biosphere.
To address this gap, Peking University and international partners launched the Planetary Health Axis System in 2024, an artificial intelligence–driven platform designed as a ‘digital compass’ for sustainable development. PHAS systematically tracks the ecological footprint of human activity and assesses risks of crossing planetary boundaries. Built on four coordinate axes – human health, species health, environmental health and societal health – it integrates multidisciplinary science using AI for real-time global data analysis, currently monitoring some 48,000 key indicators.
PHAS also introduces a paradigm shift in planetary health economics. Conventional human development models rely heavily on the growth of gross domestic product as a primary measure of success. These models are important, but they fail to fully address the increasing costs vis-à-vis planetary health boundaries. Global policymakers need new tools and metrics that embed GDP within a broader planetary economy – one that integrates multiple dimensions of well-being and sustainability.
Beyond monitoring, PHAS provides visualisation, simulation and policy-lab functions. Governments and researchers can simulate interventions, explore scenarios and co-create solutions. Conceived as a global public good, PHAS seeks to guide humanity towards more optimised relationships between social and economic progress and Earth’s natural systems. It helps frame the big questions:
- How will interconnected shocks – such as pandemics, climate extremes or conflicts – cascade across regions?
- What policy mixes yield the best outcomes for health and sustainability?
- Where are the hidden leverage points in the global system?
- How can human civilisation be charted within the safe operating zones of the planet?
A new digital compass for planetary health
The formal launch of PHAS at the World Health Summit in Berlin in October 2025 will showcase its core system and preliminary results. Early findings demonstrate that it can replicate existing science with greater precision, while also uncovering new causal pathways relevant for policy. After Berlin, engagement events are planned in China, India, Geneva and other global hubs.
PHAS is envisioned as a strategic platform for global collaboration, bringing together climate scientists, economists, epidemiologists, data scientists and others around a common modelling backbone. It is designed as a decentralised system, with regional hubs developing specialised modules connected to a shared core engine.
Planetary health – by definition – transcends borders. PHAS may have been initiated at Peking University, but it is designed as a global public good, harnessing expertise worldwide to confront planetary health as humanity’s greatest challenge since the industrial revolution. Health is a political choice – and one of the most important choices is to promote genuine global collaboration, creating the space for science to do its work.
