Climate & Health
From record-breaking heatwaves, devastating wildfires, or catastrophic tropical storms, hurricanes, and flooding, the effects of climate change are directly contributing to significant humanitarian emergencies around the globe. According to the World Health Organization (WHO), hazardous weather patterns have both direct and indirect effects on our health by increasing the risk of deaths, health emergencies, noncommunicable diseases, and the emergence and spread of infectious diseases.
Climate not only affects our physical environment, it also impacts social and economic conditions, including the ability of global health workforces, infrastructures, and systems, which in turn greatly reduces our capacity to achieve universal health coverage (UHC).
No one is safe from these risks, but it is people in low-income and disadvantaged countries and communities whose health is being harmed first — and worst — by the climate crisis, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Ironically, the people who contribute least to the causes driving climate change suffer the worst consequences.
“More fundamentally, climate shocks and growing stresses such as changing temperature and precipitation patterns, drought, floods and rising sea levels degrade the environmental and social determinants of physical and mental health. All aspects of health are affected by climate change, from clean air, water, and soil to food systems and livelihoods. Further delay in tackling climate change will increase health risks, undermine decades of improvements in global health, and contravene our collective commitments to ensure the human right to health for all.”
In 2023, WHO reported that 3.6 billion people already live in areas highly susceptible to climate change, which they project will cause at least 250,000 additional deaths each year. Climate extremes increasingly result in illnesses stemming from a broad range of causes, including air pollution, allergens and pollen, food security, food- and water-borne diarrheal disease, and mental health and stress-related disorders. Furthermore, recent research attributes 37 percent of heat-related deaths to human-induced climate change, with heat-related deaths among people over the age of 65 rising by 70 percent in the past two decades.