WHO Issues Guidance on Integrating Health Within Climate Plans

The World Health Organization is stressing the importance of “positioning health at the core of all climate negotiations, strategies, policies, and action plans” in advance of the 2024 UN Climate Change Conference.

The organization launched the COP29 special report on climate and health and a technical guidance on Healthy Nationally Determined Contributions. The former “outlines key actions aiming to protect all people, particularly the estimated 3.6 billion people who live in areas most susceptible to climate change.”

Some of the report’s top recommendations include making “human health and well-being the top measure of climate success;” ending “fossil fuel subsidies and reliance by realigning economic and financial systems to protect both people's health and the environment, through investment in clean, sustainable alternatives;” and mobilizing “financing for climate-health initiatives, particularly to strengthen responsive health systems and support the health workforce.”

WHO also released guidance about NDCs, or Nationally Determined Contributions. The guidance “outlines practical actions for ministries of health, ministries of environment, and other health-determining sectors (e.g. transport, energy, urban planning, water and sanitation) to incorporate health considerations within their adaptation and mitigation policies and actions.”

The organization stresses that integrating health within climate plans will support “addressing health impacts;” “strengthening health systems;” and “promoting co-benefits” as the effects of climate change continue.