Mainstreaming Climate Change in Health

 

Rajeev Sadanandan (CEO, HSTP)

Issues such as impact of climate change on health, One Health and Anti-Microbial Resistance are often assigned to sector specialists to manage, without recognising their significance for the entire health system. For instance, climate change impacts most diseases, either directly or indirectly. Understanding the pathways of impact will assist prevention and mitigation. If policy makers recognise the causality between a climate event and an increase in disease burden it would stimulate investments on research in this area. 

To illustrate, epidemiologists map the seasonality of diseases. Traditionally some diseases occur in certain periods, partly due to the increase in vectors during favourable climatic conditions. But if the weather cycles or monsoons become erratic, the predictability of infectious diseases is lost. Epidemiologists will then need to disaggregate each causative factors and then assess their impact. For instance, an unseasonal rain may leave puddles in peri domestic spaces where Aedes mosquitoes could grow leading to a dengue epidemic at a time when it is not anticipated. Rain should then become a red flag for public health officials to act. We have seen spikes in vector-borne diseases in abnormally hot years. However, the connection between weather conditions and infectious disease is not fully known and needs to be researched to plan an intervention. Similarly understanding the relationship between heat and pollution will improve our ability to mitigate their impact on pulmonary diseases.

At HSTP we are engaged in sensitising policymakers to understand the importance of issues such as climate change, One Health and AMR in health management. We hope to persuade governments to set up structures and systems, with budget provisions and competent staff, to manage them. Given the lack of familiarity with the issues these are likely to be standalone interventions to begin with. But we hope to mainstream them with the health system in the future. 

This article was published in HSTP's monthly newsletter The Transformation Tracker. To read the entire newsletter, click here.