Health ministers from around the world urged negotiators at the United Nations COP28 climate talks on Sunday to address the effects of climate change on global health.
World Health Organization Director of Public Health and Environment Dr. María Neira said extreme weather events, heat and increased transmission of disease are all exacerbated by climate change and are taking an enormous toll.
"This is putting at risk all we have achieved until now in terms of global health," Neira said at a press conference in Dubai, where the United Arab Emirates is hosting COP28.
By contrast, she said, shifting to cleaner energy sources to address climate change could also reduce health damage from air pollution that kills millions of people each year.
"The benefits that can be obtained for health are enormous," she said.
This was the first time the annual U.N. climate talks have dedicated a full day to health concerns. Many countries' health ministers attended this year's event, placing a stronger emphasis on the health and social implications of government decisions on climate, something WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said was long overdue.
"The climate crisis is a health crisis," Ghebreyesus said in a statement, "but for too long, health has been a footnote in climate discussions."
The health sector receives only 0.5 percent of global climate financing, according to the WHO, and Ghebreyesus asked for financial commitments to match the scale of the challenge.
Some philanthropic groups responded. The Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria announced this weekend $300 million to help health systems better prepare for climate impacts, and the Rockefeller Foundation announced $100 million to scale up climate and health solutions. The Rockefeller Foundation and Foundation S, the philanthropic organization of French pharmaceutical and healthcare company Sanofi, also launched an initiative to determine how funding can be more effective for climate health solutions.
Foundation S Director General Vanina Laurent-Ledru said health funding needs to be scaled up and delivered faster to places in need.
"They need the funding now to adapt to a changing climate because it's killing them," she told Newsweek.
Laurent-Ledru said communities she has worked with in Chad provide an example of the many health impacts climate change is already having. Unprecedented flooding damaged fields that farmers relied on.
"That causes migration, of course, but the floods also wiped away the few healthcare facilities that the people have," she said. Another health threat emerged after floodwaters receded. "They are also seeing malaria in the area because the mosquitoes can now breed in the pools of water that are left from the flood."
Because malaria was not previously widespread in the area, many healthcare workers there are not trained in treatment and families don't know how to protect themselves, Laurent-Ledru explained.
Health ministers also stressed the potential health benefits of climate action. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels also cuts soot and smog, the biggest environmental threats to health globally. A study released just days before COP28 got underway found such pollution reductions could have an even bigger health effect than had been realized.
Researchers writing in the journal The BMJ found that deaths attributable to air pollution from fossil fuels in industry, power generation, and transportation have been underestimated, and such pollution likely accounts for 5.1 million extra deaths a year worldwide.
In an editorial accompanying the study, researchers wrote that improved air quality would also lead to healthier lives and fewer hospital admissions, easing the burden on health systems.
"The benefits of a fossil fuel phase-out on global health, in addition to the climate, must be recognized and play a key role in shaping discussions at COP28," the researchers concluded.
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