World ill-prepared to stop climate crisis reversing progress on health, says study

The climate crisis threatens to roll back decades of progress towards better health and governments are ill-prepared to stop it, the World Meteorological Organization has said.

Three-quarters of national weather agencies send climate data to their country’s health officials but less than one in four health ministries use the information to protect people from risks such as extreme heat, the report found.

“Climate change is an unprecedented threat to human health,” said Madeleine Thomson, the head of climate impacts and adaptation at the Wellcome, a charity that funds health research, who helped write the report. “Many countries are already having to deal with the dangerous repercussions of record-breaking temperatures. Yet most are ill-prepared.”

The report, which was written by the WMO along with more than 30 partner institutions, found that despite hot weather killing more people than any other type of extreme weather, health experts had access to heat warning services in only half of the affected countries.

Scientists have warned that heatwaves will grow hotter and longer because of the climate crisis. The world has already warmed by 1.2C above pre-industrial levels. Even so, the record-breaking temperatures this year have left scientists stunned.

Prof Petteri Taalas, the secretary general of the WMO, said: “Practically the whole planet has experienced heatwaves this year. The onset of El Niño in 2023 will greatly increase the likelihood of breaking temperature records further, triggering more extreme heat in many parts of the world and in the ocean – and making the challenge even greater.”

In an attempt to reduce the loss of life, the WMO and the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction have led a push to provide early warning systems for all people on the planet by 2028. Only half of countries say they have adequate multi-hazard early warning systems, according to the WMO.

The report also criticised the lack of investment in healthcare as the planet heats up. Just 0.2% of the loans and grants given to climate adaptation projects went to schemes that identified health as the primary focus, the authors found. “This leaves the health sector ill-prepared to safeguard the most vulnerable.”

Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general of the World Health Organization, said: “The climate crisis is a health crisis, driving more severe and unpredictable weather events, fuelling disease outbreaks, and contributing to higher rates of noncommunicable diseases. By working together to make high-quality climate services more accessible to the health sector, we can help to protect the health and wellbeing of people facing the perils of climate change.”

Photograph: Spencer Platt/Getty Images