Building climate resistance in medical facilities

Climate change affects health in many ways, including leading to death and disease from increasingly frequent extreme weather events such as heat, storms and floods, disruption of food systems and increases in animal, insect, food and water-borne diseases. Climate change also affects mental health.

Climate change undermines the social determinants of good health, such as livelihoods, equity and access to health care and social support structures. Climate change affects groups most at risk of vulnerability and disadvantage, such as women, children, minorities, poor people, migrants, the elderly and people with pre-existing conditions.

The short- to medium-term impacts of climate change depend on the level of risk and resilience in communities. In the long term, the effects will increasingly depend on actions taken now to increase resilience and address the root causes of climate change, such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions. (More on reliefweb.int)