FN & the UN SDGs 14-17

Nightingale and the UN SDGs
Advocacy for a Healthy World
to Celebrate Her 2020 Bicentenary

Deva-Marie Beck, PhD, RN

Featuring UN Sustainable Development Goals • SDGs 14 — 17

SDG # 14 — Life Below Water — aims to “conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.” Nightingale herself made many sea voyages and remarked about her own love for the ocean. “When I was a child, I remember reading that Sir Isaac Newton said in his last hours: 'I seem to myself like a child who has been playing with a few pebbles on the sea shore — leaving unsearched all the wonders of the great ocean beyond.'” (1872)

Dolphins play at a favorite whale watching site in Mirissa Beach, off the coast of Sri Lanka. in 2011. Photo Source: Wikimedia, posted by Arian Zwegers, This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license. SDG Logo # 14 posted using the official UN SDG Guidelines.

From her work to improve the quality of life in India, as noted on our webpage about SDG 13, Nightingale also anticipated the thrust of SDG # 15 — Life on Land — to “protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss.” She connected these concerns with the recovery of individuals who are sick. “The effect in sickness of beautiful object, of variety of objects, and especially of brilliancy of colour is hardly at all appreciated... I shall never forget the rapture of fever patients over a bunch of bright-coloured flowers. I remember (in my own case) a nosegay of wild flowers being sent me, and from that moment recovery becoming more rapid... ” (1860)

Urban roof garden in Seattle, Washington, 2007. Photo Source: Wikimedia, posted by Joe Mable, with a GNU Free Documentation License. SDG Logo # 15 posted using the official UN SDG Guidelines.

Two young girls in the Palestinian territories. Photo Source: Wikimedia, posted by Photographer: Justin McIntosh in 2004. Used with the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 2.0 Generic license. SDG Logo # 16 posted using the official UN SDG Guidelines.

Building upon her own service to soldiers during the Crimean War and for many years thereafter, Nightingale was keenly awareness of the measures needed to prevent war and to promote peace. With this experience and knowledge, she was called upon to write (anonymously) of the British government’s official text submitted to craft the first Geneva Convention, which later led directly to establishing the League of Nations and the United Nations. Her early insights and passionate commitment to this field of human concern therefore led directly to the establishment of SDG # 16 — Peace & Justice — to “promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels.”

The last SDG — # 17 — calls for Global Partnerships for the Goals as essential ingredients to achieve all the other SDGs — to “strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for sustainable development.” As a nurse, Nightingale often served the suffering by building collaborative relationships with others of like-mind and heart. From her own wide worldview of caring — with a worldwide network of colleagues from many disciplines — Nightingale took her own stand to courageously advocate for and about the needs of others. She was a change agent who set a culture of caring for others and collaborating with other in motion — still continuing, even now, into the wider possibilities of the 21st century.

Participant ‘’Delegates’ and their assigned nations at the Model World Health Organization Assembly convened in March, 2010, at Ryerson University in Toronto, Ontario. Canada, where two NIGH Founders, Deva-Marie Beck and Wayne Kines, participated. Photo used with permission. SDG Logo # 17 posted using the official UN SDG Guidelines.

See more about UN SDGs 1 to 5 and Nightingale's connections to these Goals >>

See more about UN SDGs 6 to 9 and Nightingale's connections to these Goals >>

See more about UN SDGs 1o to 13 and Nightingale's connections to these Goals >>

Image Credits, above left: the UN Logo Color wheel used based on official UN SDG Guidelines.
Above right: the face of Florence Nightingale is a photograph in the public domain.