Opening event:

Online-Seminar (⇓ Leaflet)
„Climate Change and Global Child Health“
with subsequent discussion

Friday 19.03.2021 at 18-19:30 CET
Zoom-Link (Registration via your own Zoom account): Click here to join
Dr. Reinhard Koppenleitner (GTP member and vice chairman of the German Alliance for Climate Change and Health [KLUG] e.V.) will set the scene with an introductory talk followed by a discussion round including planning of further activities in regards to climate change within the GTP.

 

Invitation to found a working group “Climate Change and Global Child Health” within the GTP

Our vision

The GTP aims at „improving child health world-wide“, especially in countries with limited ressources. In order to achieve this goal a thorough analysis and impression of the multiple factors endangering child health world-wide is needed.  Health is not only influenced by the lack of preventive and curing medical services on national level but also by various global factors.

One central global component is climate change (Castello, Lancet 2009), which even manifests itself as climate crisis or climate catastrophe in some parts of the world.

The planet is facing increasing numbers of heat waves (Robinson 2013), floddings, droughts, crop loss, decrease in lokal productivity (i.e. http://www.fao.org/climate-change), water scarcity, air polution, fires as well as wars and displacements resulting from these issues.

The consequences for health an life are known: Malnutrition including illnesses caused by it as well as increased vulnerability towards further pathologies due to a weakened immune system. Spread of zoonotic infections due to vector distribution. Migration. Flight and displacement resulting in among other things the loss of access to health care structures and education for children and adolescents. Mental health issues resulting from these circumstances are still a very neglected component.

Prior estimates of climate change progression and its consequences need to constantly be adjusted due to more rapid progression and paint a dramatic picture for the upcoming decades. Climate researchers agree that there is a detectabe acceleration in the rising of the sea level as well as an increase in uninhabitable territory.

All people are effected but the heaviest burden lies on vulnerable groups like children in the global south. The highest fatality rates, far exeeding the current level, are to be expected within these groups. We are currently witnesssing the beginnings of this development in Eastern Africa (https://kenya.savethechildren.net/news/climate-change-wajir-risks-mother-and-child-survival), Australia or in the Middle East. Therefore following questions need to be asked: (1) How can we avert this development (Mitigation) and (2) how can we weaken its consequences for the people (Adaptation)?

The GTP can play an important role in advocating for affected populations and can use its international network to spread information about the effects of climate change on child health. Ideally the GTP will be perceived as advisor to government institutions and political decision makers who engage with topics regarding development cooperations, who define projects and who finance their implementation.

As a first step the GTP will have to gather information from its partners in the global south about their experiences with the impact of climate change and to discuss those within the organization. Thereafter the GTP will have to define ways how to incorporate climate change thematically into its strategies, which priority it should be given and which activities will be possible and reasonable. In order to proceed effectively we will have a close look at existing information and ressources of other relevant organizations and we will aim at close collaboration with organizations, who primarily focus on prevention, research and political engagement in regards to climate change.

In order to establish importance for the topic of climate change within the GTP and in order to actively address it we would like to constitute a working group “Climate Change and Global Child Health”. If you would like to participate in the process and activities please contact Dr. Reinhard Koppenleitner (email)

Links related to the topic:

www.klimawandel-gesundheit.de
www.healthforfuture.de
www.planetary-health-academy.de

 

Literature:

Blum AJ, Hotez PJ. “Global “worming”: Climate change and its projected general impact on human helminth infections”. PLoS Negl Trop Dis 12(7): e0006370. https://doi.org/10.137/journal.pntd.0006370. Free full text.
Castello A, et al. “Managing the health effects of climate change”. The Lancet Commissions. Volume 373, ISSUE 9676, P1693-1733, May 16, 2009. Free full text.
Dim Coumou and Alexander Robinson 2013 Environ. Res. Lett. 8 034018. Free full text.
Helldén D t al. “Climate change and child health: a scoping review and an expanded conceptual framework”. Lancet Planet Health 2021. 5: e164–75. Free full text

Tidman R, et al. “The impact of climate change on neglected tropical diseases: a systematic review”. Trans R Soc Trop Med Hyg. 2021, 115: 147-168. Free full text.