Public health engagement is critical to ensure that the public health sector prepares for climate impacts, and that climate change strategies promote optimal health and reduce health inequities. Our research delves deeper into the complex barriers to this important work, and identifies a number of immediate opportunities for public health and partners to work together towards improved health, equity, and climate change outcomes. These research findings helped to guide us in development of the framework we present below and in our recommendations for action.
Intervention StrategiesCommunity Capacity Building and Engagement
Partnerships
Advocacy
Communications
Surveillance, Evaluation, and Research
Root CausesSocial Inequities
Race/ethnicity, class, immigration status, gender, sexual orientation
Root CausesInstitutional Power
Government, schools, corporations, businesses, NGOs, faith organizations
Intervention StrategiesHealthy Communities and Environmental Change
Bike lanes, parks, barter systems, community gardens, healthy housing.
Intervention StrategiesPolicy and Systems Change
Intervention StrategiesPolicy and Systems Change
Root CausesSystems
Land use, transportation, energy, water, agriculture/food, economic, health care
Health Processes and StrategiesLiving Conditions
Physical: Transportation, housing, residential segregation, air/water/soil, work, greenspace
Social: Experience of inequities, social capital, support, isolation
Economic: Income, wealth, support
Services: Health care, education, retail
Intervention StrategiesMitigation
Clean energy, conservation and efficiency, bike, walk, transit, land use, forest preservation, agricultural practices, carbon capture
Climate Processes and StrategiesOther Environmental Impacts
Fisheries collapse, biodiversity loss, resource depletion
Intervention StrategiesHealth Education
Nutrition, smoking cessation, physical activity
Intervention StrategiesRisk Reduction
Mold and toxin remediation, water quality and provision
Safety Net
Food assistance, social security, health care access
Health Processes and StrategiesHealth Behaviors
Nutrition, physical activity, violence, smoking, stress management, substance use
Health Processes and StrategiesHealth Risks and Exposures
Particulate matter, toxins, mold, secondhand smoke, violence, traffic, noise, food insecurity
Health + Climate Processes and StrategiesIndividual and Community Climate Change Vulnerability and Resilience
Intersection of resources (including social connection), coping mechanisms, exposures, and susceptibility
Health Co-Benefits or Co-Harms
Active transportation/physical activity; urban greening/food security/physical activity; SO2 seeding/air pollution; environmental justice & health equity impacts
Intervention StrategiesPublic Health Preparedness
Health risk assessment, community response teams, medical surge capacity
Health Processes and StrategiesHealth & Inequities Impacts
Chronic disease: Cardiovascular disease, asthma, diabetes
Injury
Infectious disease: HIV, flu
Reproductive outcomes
Stress/mental health:
Intervention StrategiesMedical Care
Asthma management, injury care, medications, rehabilitative and support services
Disability and Death
Health and Social Costs
Intervention StrategiesClimate Education
Promote biking to work, plant-based diet, energy conservation, climate awareness
Climate Processes and StrategiesClimate Behaviors
Energy use, bike/walk/drive, diet/cooking, consumption and waste
Intervention StrategiesGeo-engineering
Ocean iron fertilization, space mirrors, sulfur dioxide release, cloud manipulation
Intervention StrategiesAdaptation
Seawalls, managed retreat, vaccination, urban heat island mitigation, sustainable food systems, vulnerability assessment, water conservation
Intervention StrategiesDisaster Risk Reduction
Cooling zones, weather warnings, hospital generators.
Intervention StrategiesDisaster Recovery
Response, clean up, relocation, rebuilding
Climate Processes and StrategiesGreenhouse Gas Emissions
CO2, methane, black carbon, other short-lived greenhouse gases
Climate Processes and StrategiesGlobal Climate Impacts
Warming oceans, acidification, seal level rise, climate variability, glacier and snow pack loss
Climate Processes and StrategiesLocal Climate Impacts
Extreme weather events, heat, precipitation, drought, flooding, saline incursion, wildfires
Climate Processes and StrategiesIntermediate Factors
Environmental: Ozone, water pollution, pollen production, microbial contamination, vector distribution, crop yield
Socioeconomic: Food and water prices, job loss, conflict over water, land, or food
Climate Processes and StrategiesClimate Change Health & Inequities Impacts
Injuries and drowning, heat illness, water-, food-, and vector-borne illness, displacement, food/water insecurity, stress/mental health, chronic disease
Please review the full Climate Change, Health, and Equity: Opportunities for Action report for more information.