Stories

Tag: climate crisis

  • The imperative for climate action to protect health and the role of education

    The imperative for climate action to protect health and the role of education

    “The Imperative for Climate Action to Protect Health” is an article that examines the current and projected health impacts of climate change, as well as the potential health benefits of actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The authors state that “climate change is causing injuries, illnesses, and deaths, with the risks projected to increase substantially with additional climate change.” 

    Specifically, the article notes that approximately “250,000 deaths annually between 2030 and 2050 could be due to climate change–related increases in heat exposure in elderly people, as well as increases in diarrheal disease, malaria, dengue, coastal flooding, and childhood stunting.” The impacts will fall disproportionately on vulnerable populations, and climate change “could force more than 100 million people into extreme poverty by 2030.”

    The article discusses major exposure pathways that link climate hazards to health outcomes like “heat-related illness and death, illnesses caused by poor air quality, undernutrition from reduced food quality and security, and selected vectorborne diseases.” It also notes that “the effects of climate change on mental health are increasingly recognized.”

    Importantly, the authors argue that “opportunities exist to capitalize on environmental data to develop early warning and response systems” to help adaptation efforts. Furthermore, “investments in and policies to promote proactive and effective adaptation and reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions (mitigation) would decrease the magnitude and pattern of health risks.”

    The article highlights that “transitions in land, energy, industry, buildings, transportation, and cities” aimed at “limiting global warming to 1.5°C” would bring substantial public health benefits. For example, “strong climate policies consistent with the 2°C Paris Agreement target could prevent approximately 175,000 premature deaths” in the US by 2030. More broadly, the authors state that “policies to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions in the energy sector, housing, transportation; and agriculture and food systems can result in near-term ancillary benefits to human health.”

    The review thus underscores that “protecting [public] health demands decisive actions from health professionals and governments” in tackling climate change through adaptation and ambitious mitigation policies that yield health “co-benefits.”

    What is the role of education?

    The review article presents clear evidence that climate change is already severely harming public health, with escalating threats projected, particularly for vulnerable communities. It rightly argues that responding effectively requires urgent adaptation and emissions reductions prioritizing those most impacted.

    However, conventional top-down approaches to climate and health in global health are unlikely to achieve the rapid, scalable results needed. Such traditional modalities tend to be ponderously slow, generate knowledge not readily actionable, and fail to reach those on the frontlines in marginalized locales.

    Building a new scientific field around climate and health may take years using conventional approaches.

    What we would wish for instead is a decentralized, grassroots peer learning system that can directly empower and assist under-resourced local health workers confronting growing climate-health crises.

    Specifically, a digital network interconnecting one million such frontline personnel to share granular insights on how climate change is damaging community health in their areas.

    This system would facilitate collaborative design of hyperlocal adaptation initiatives tailored to each locale’s distinct climate-health challenges.

    It would channel localized knowledge to shape responsive national policies rooted in lived realities on the ground.

    Digital tools would amplify voices of those observing firsthand impacts too often excluded.

    And participatory methods would synthesize nuanced community observations lacking in conventional statistics.

    This locally-attuned, equity-oriented learning infrastructure could unlock community leadership to catalyze climate-health solutions where needs are greatest. 

    It represents the kind of decentralized, rapidly scalable approach essential to address the review’s calls for urgent action assisting vulnerable groups most harmed by climate change.

    Reference: Haines, A., Ebi, K., 2019. The Imperative for Climate Action to Protect Health. N Engl J Med 380, 263–273. https://doi.org/10.1056/NEJMra1807873

    Illustration: The Geneva Learning Foundation Collection © 2024

  • Climate change is a threat to the health of the communities we serve: health workers speak out at COP28

    Climate change is a threat to the health of the communities we serve: health workers speak out at COP28

    The Geneva Learning Foundation’s Charlotte Mbuh spoke today at the COP28 Health Pavilion in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE). Watch the speech at COP28…

    Good afternoon. I am Charlotte Mbuh. I have worked for the health of children and families in Cameroon for over 15 years.

    I am one of more than 5,500 health workers from 68 countries who have connected to share our observations of how climate is affecting the health of those we serve. 

    “Going back home to the community where I grew up as a child, I was shocked to see that most of the rivers we used to swim and fish in have all dried up, and those that are still there have become very shallow so that you can easily walk through a river you required a boat to cross in years past.”

    These are the words of Samuel Chukwuemeka Obasi, a health worker from Nigeria.

    Dr Kumbha Gopi, a health worker from India said: “The use of motor vehicles has led to an increase in air pollution and we see respiratory problems and skin diseases”.

    Climate change is hurting the health of those we serve. And it is getting worse.

    Few here would deny that health workers are an essential voice to listen to in order to understand climate impacts on health.

    Yet, a man named Jacob on social media snapped: “Since when are health workers the authority on air pollution?”

    Here are the words of Bie Lilian Mbando, a health worker from my country: “Where I live in Buea, the flood from Mount Cameroon took away all belongings of people in my neighborhood and killed a secondary school student who was playing football with his friends.”

    Climate change is killing communities.

    Cecilia Nabwirwa, a nurse in Nairobi, Kenya: “I remember my grand-son getting sick after eating vegetables grown along areas flooded by sewage. Since then I resolved to growing my own vegetables to ensure healthy eating.”

    And yet, another man on social media, Robert, found this “ridiculous. As if my friend who sells fish at his fish stall comes as an expert on water quality.”

    I wondered: why such brutal responses?

    Well, unlike scientists or global agencies, we cannot be dismissed as “experts from on-high”.

    What we know, we know because we are here every day.

    We are part of the community.

    And we know that climate change is a threat to the health of the communities we serve.

    We are already having to manage the impacts of climate change on health.

    We are doing the best that we can.

    But we need your support.

    The global community is investing in building a new scientific field around climate and health.

    Massive investments are also being made in policy.

    Are we making a commensurate investment in people and communities?

    That should mean investing in health workers.

    What will happen if this investment is neglected?

    What if big global donors say: “it’s important, but it’s not part of our strategy?”

    Well, in 5, 10, or 15 years, we will certainly have much improved science and, hopefully, policy.

    Yet, some communities might reject better science and policy.

    Will the global community then wonder: “Why don’t they know what’s good for them?” 

    I am an immunization worker. For over 15 years, I have worked for my country’s ministry of health.

    Like my colleagues from all over the world, I know more than a little about what it takes to establish and maintain trust.

    Trust in vaccination, trust in public health.

    Trust that by standing together in the face of critical threats to our societies, we all stand to do better.

    Local communities in the poorest countries are already bearing the brunt of climate change effects on health.

    Local solutions are needed.

    Health workers are trusted advisors to the communities we serve.

    With every challenge, there is an opportunity.

    On 28 July 2023, 4,700 health workers began learning from each other through the Geneva Learning Foundation’s platform, community, and network.

    Thousands more are connecting with each other, because they choose to.

    And because they want to take action.

    It is our duty to support them.

    In March 2024, we will hold the tenth Teach to Reach conference.

    The last edition reached over 17,000 health workers from more than 80 countries.

    This time, our focus will be on climate and health.

    We invite global partners to join, to listen and to learn.

    We invite you to consider how you, your organization, your government might support action by health workers on the frontline.

    Because we will rise.

    As health workers, with or without your support, we will continue to stand up with courage, compassion and commitment, working to lift up our communities.

    Our perseverance calls us all to press forward towards climate justice and health equity.

    I wish to challenge us, as a global community, to rise together, so that  the voices of those on the frontline of climate change will be at the next Conference of Parties.

    By standing together, we all stand to do better.

    Thank you.