COP30: Climate Crisis Is A Health Crisis, WHO Warns As Philanthropies Pledge $300m For Solutions

By Felipe de Carvalho, in Belém
14
November 2025

The special
report on health and climate change, published by the UN
World Health Organization (WHO) and the
Brazilian Government, warns that one in 12 hospitals could
face climate-related shutdowns. It calls for urgent action
to protect health systems in a rapidly warming
world.

This follows Thursday’s launch of the Belém
Health Action Plan, a flagship COP30 initiative putting
health at the centre of climate policy.

What the WHO
says

“The climate crisis is a health crisis – not
in the distant future, but here and now,” said WHO
Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom
Ghebreyesus.

“This special report provides evidence
on the impact of climate change on individuals and health
systems, and real-world examples of what countries can do
– and are doing – to protect health and strengthen
health systems.”

Why it matters

Global
temperatures are already above 1.5°C. The report finds that
3.3 to 3.6 billion people live in areas highly vulnerable to
climate impacts, while hospitals face a 41 per cent higher
risk of damage from extreme weather compared to
1990.

Without rapid decarbonisation, the number of
health facilities at risk could double by mid-century. The
health sector itself contributes around 5 per cent of global
greenhouse gas emissions, underscoring the need for a swift
transition to low-carbon, climate-resilient
systems.

Key gaps in health adaptation

The
report highlights stark gaps in health adaptation
planning:

• Only 54 per cent of
  national health adaptation plans assess risks to health
  facilities.
• Fewer than 30 per cent
  consider income disparities.
• Just
  20 per cent take gender into
  account.
• Less than 1 per cent
  include people with disabilities.

Progress has
been made – the number of countries with multi-hazard
early warning systems doubled between 2015 and 2023 – but
coverage remains uneven, especially in least developed
countries and small island states.

What’s being
done

Adding momentum, a coalition of more than 35
philanthropies today pledged $300 million to accelerate
solutions at the intersection of climate and
health.

The Climate and Health Funders Coalition –
which includes Bloomberg Philanthropies, the Gates
Foundation, IKEA Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation, and
Wellcome – will back innovations, policies and research on
extreme heat, air pollution and climate-sensitive diseases,
as well as strengthen health systems and data integration.
Find out more
here.

The coalition’s inaugural funding effort
supports the Belém Health Action Plan and aims to deliver
“no-regret” interventions that save lives now. With the
past decade the hottest on record and temperatures set to
remain near historic highs, experts warn that failure to act
risks catastrophic consequences for human
health.

‘Adaptation is urgent’: COP30 health
envoy calls for action

UN News spoke with
Ethel Maciel, COP30’s special envoy for health and one of
the architects of the Belém Health Action Plan. She
stressed that climate change is no longer a distant threat
– it is reshaping health systems now.

“Then, how
do we prepare our health units, our hospitals, our
structures for these extreme events that will happen with
increasing frequency? And how can we provide training and
capacity-building for health professionals so that they can
face these extreme events that will be caused by what we are
already experiencing in these climate changes,” she
said.

“One example here in Brazil, was last year’s
flooding in Rio Grande do Sul, [which triggered] the largest
dengue epidemic in history, driven by these climate changes.
So, it is not something for us to think about in the future;
it’s happening now. So, thinking about how to adapt our
system is urgent.”

Ms. Maciel outlined three pillars
of the plan:

• Monitoring to
  integrate climate and health data, enabling forecasts of
  heat-related health demand and better reporting of
  climate-linked cases.
• Resilient systems and
  training so health professionals can identify and
  treat impacts such as dehydration or cardiac
  stress.
• Research and innovation to
  develop heat-resistant medicines and vaccines, cut
  pollution in health supply chains, and expand renewable
  energy use.

She warned that implementation is
critical in the Amazon, where deforestation could unleash
unknown pathogens. “We have … pathogens that we do not
yet even fully [understand],” she said, urging leaders to
ensure the plan “does not become just another paper and
another very beautiful declaration, but that does not happen
in
practice.”

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