In the lead-up to this year's United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26), many countries made significant commitments to increase their contributions to global climate finance. These commitments are crucial steps toward achieving the pledge made by wealthy countries in the 2015 Paris Agreement to mobilize at least $100 billion annually to support climate adaptation and mitigation in low- and middle-income countries. While there has been much focus on closing the global climate financing gap—just $79.6 billion of climate finance was mobilized in 2019—there is another critical gap that must be urgently addressed. It is the largely nonexistent funding for health sector adaptation to climate change.

Climate change harms health in numerous ways—and the 2021 Lancet Countdown report has described the present situation as a "code red for a healthy future." Sea level rise, wildfires, extreme heat, hurricanes, and floods damage our hearts and lungs, increase the risk of infectious disease, worsen mental health, reverse decades of gains in nutritional status, and cause injury and death. Climate change weakens and destroys hospitals and essential health infrastructure, and health systems are largely unprepared to respond to the rising health harms of climate change. The investment needed to build climate-resilient health systems that can withstand climate threats and protect people from climate harms is notably absent from both worlds of climate and health finance. This climate-health financing gap threatens the lives of millions, leaves health systems without critical support, and deepens global health inequity. The global community must prioritize health sector adaptation by addressing three funding challenges.

Climate Adaptation Dollars Are Thin

Finance for climate adaptation is generally inadequate across all sectors, including health. Over the past decade, only 20 percent of global climate finance targeted adaptation, and current commitments to adaptation finance fall well short of need. While adaptation finance rose to around $20 billion in 2019, the average annual adaptation costs in low- and middle-income countries are estimated to be $70 billion today and they will climb to $300 billion by 2030. The World Health Organization's COP26 Health Report emphasizes the value of investing in health adaptation and resilience and calls on governments to allocate half of their climate finance to adaptation, especially for the health sector.

Finance for health adaptation falls through the cracks of siloed funding schemes. Almost no climate finance targets the health sector, and nearly no global health finance targets climate adaptation. Less than 5 percent of total global adaptation spending, and less than 1 percent of multilateral climate adaptation finance targets health. Of more than 200 adaptation projects supported by the Green Climate Fund and other funding pools under the auspices of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change since 2015, none specifically focused on health. At the same time, very little development assistance for health targets climate change. In 2018, only 3 percent of international donor funding for health was allocated for climate change projects.

This article was published in Think Global Health. Read More here.