The World Health Organization (WHO) has warned that climate change's impact on human health will be a key issue at the 31st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP31), which Türkiye will host in Antalya on Nov. 9-20.
The report said health would feature prominently on the COP31 agenda, emphasizing that the climate crisis is also a health crisis whose impacts are felt unequally across regions and populations.
“Climate change is a major threat to human health, and no country or community is immune. The burden of climate change is disproportionately distributed across regions and communities. An estimated 3.3 billion to 3.6 billion people live in conditions that make them highly vulnerable to climate change,” the report said.
More than 90% of deaths caused by climate-related disasters over the past 20 years occurred in developing countries, according to the report.
Children, pregnant women, newborns, older people, individuals with existing health conditions and displaced people were identified as particularly vulnerable to climate change.
The report stressed the importance of equitable health interventions, saying the Pre-COP meeting in Fiji and COP31 would offer opportunities to highlight the issue.
It added that climate summits since COP26 in Glasgow had introduced tools, plans and policies to advance climate-related health action.
“Antalya offers an opportunity to turn these visions into reality,” the report said, calling for the implementation of the Belem Health Action Plan (BHAP), adopted at COP30 in Brazil.
The BHAP identifies three priority areas for adaptation in the health sector: surveillance and monitoring, evidence-based policies and strategies alongside capacity-building, and innovation, production and digital health.
The report also highlighted the Antalya Initiative for Health Resilience (AIR), describing it as a voluntary, nonbinding, country-led mechanism for sharing national experiences in climate and health action.
The initiative was designed to facilitate collaborative learning and build a bridge toward COP32 and beyond, it said.
AIR will be launched with a document showcasing Türkiye's achievements and establishing a benchmark for countries' contributions. It will provide a trust-based, nonbinding framework for sharing experiences and serve as a bridge to COP32 and subsequent climate conferences through a collective pool of knowledge and experience, according to the report.
WHO report outlines six measures to save 1.6 million lives annually
Separately, the WHO published a report titled Global Benefits and Costs of Priority Actions on Climate Change and Health.
The report said six proven measures addressing climate change and health could save 1.6 million lives annually while generating trillions of dollars in economic and financial benefits.
The measures include heat-health warning systems, climate-resilient drinking water services, basic sanitation, hygiene and handwashing facilities, cleaner household fuels and technologies for cooking and heating, and efficient fossil fuel pricing policies.
The six measures could help prevent 16.7 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually, equivalent to 31% of global greenhouse gas emissions, excluding those from land use, land-use change and forestry, the report said.
The measures could also generate $3.9 trillion in annual economic welfare and an additional $5.4 trillion in financial benefits, according to the report.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the climate crisis was also a health crisis, adding that much of its harm could be prevented using existing tools.
“As governments prepare for the next round of climate negotiations, protecting health must be at the heart of climate action,” Ghebreyesus said.
