Climate change Major threat to children’s health

Lydia Baker

Climate change, once perceived as an ‘environmental’ issue, has far-reaching impacts on the health and survival of people - especially the world’s poorest children

The reality today is that nearly nine million children each year die before they reach the age of five. The vast majority of these deaths - 97 percent - occur in low-or middle-income countries, and disproportionately within the poorest communities and households. Most children are dying as a result of a small number of diseases

and conditions including malnutrition, pneumonia, measles, diarrhea, malaria, HIV and AIDS, and neo-natal conditions.

Against this backdrop, recently climate change was described as the biggest global health threat of the 21st century. It will affect children’s health in a range of different ways.

It will increase the prevalence of diseases most likely to kill children, as well as undermine the foundations for child survival: functioning health systems, women’s education and empowerment, food security, clean water and safe sanitation.

While no-one will be immune to the effects of climate change, children from the poorest families in low-and middle-income countries will be at particular risk.

Climate fluctuation

This is especially true for children under the age of five, who make up between 10 percent and 20 percent of the total population in many of the countries predicted to be most affected by climate change. Children in this age group often have less immunity to disease and infection, putting them at further risk.

Diarrhea, for example, claims the lives of around two million children under the age of five each year. A lack of access to water and sanitation is responsible for around 90 percent of these deaths and, as climate change will substantially reduce water availability, the caseload of diarrhea is predicted to increase by between 2 percent and 10 percent by 2020.

As children, especially those under age five, are by far the largest group who die as a result of diarrhea, they will carry the majority of the burden.

No-one will be immune, but the poorest children will be at particular risk

Malnutrition is an underlying cause in the death of 3.2 million children each year, and 178 million children suffer from malnutrition.

Some of the countries with the highest rates of malnutrition in the world, including Bangladesh, Ethiopia, India and Vietnam, are also predicted to be some of the worst affected by climate fluctuation in the future.

Not only will climate change affect the availability of food in some of the world’s poorest countries, it’s expected to push up food prices.

This is particularly worrying for children from the poorest families, as access to food depends not only on its availability but more importantly on a family’s ability to buy it.

Poor families often spend up to 80 percent of their income on food, and even then, this is rarely sufficient to provide their children with a healthy and nutritious diet.

Severe climatic events

Beyond the direct effects of climate change on disease and malnutrition, natural disasters which already affect the lives of millions of people every year and pose unique threats to children’s health and nutrition - are becoming more frequent and severe. This trend is predicted to continue and gain pace, with the number of disasters predicted to increase by as much as 320 percent in the next 20 years.

Save the Children estimates that over the same period, 175 million children will be affected each year by the kind of natural disasters exacerbated by climate change.

From the drought that is affecting around 25 million people across East Africa to the storms and floods affecting South-East Asia, the reality is that these events will take an increasing toll on children. In Wajir, North-East Kenya, where Save the Children is implementing an emergency nutrition program, the failure of the rains again this year has been a devastating blow to a pastoralist community living on the edge of survival.

Eighteen-month-old Mahar, one of many children receiving treatment, has been admitted to hospital on four separate occasions for malnutrition. Like many others, Mahat’s family was relatively well-off until the prolonged drought: they used to have more than 50 cattle; now they have none. While doctors can treat Mahat’s illnesses with antibiotics, the real problem is that there isn’t enough food at home to help the child grow strong and fully recover. Mahat’s mother breaks down into tears when asked what the future holds for her child.

Child mortality

Recent decades have seen severe drying in many parts of Eastern Africa; this is the fourth year in a row that this part of Kenya has experienced a severe drought. Climate projections show that across the world this is a reality for which, increasingly, we must prepare. The percentage of the earth’s land mass that suffers from severe drought conditions has trebled in the past 10 years from 1 percent to 3 percent.

This figure is predicted to be 8 percent by 2020, and no less than 30 percent by the end of the century. Recurrent disasters undermine resilience and reduce a family’s ability to cope and adapt to climate change in the longterm. Unfortunately, without high levels of investment in disaster risk reduction and measures to help the poorest countries adapt to climate change, stories like Mahat’s will become increasingly common.

While the research evidence linking climate change with child mortality is clear and mounting, there is still a lack of recognition and focus on the particular issues facing children at international, national and local levels. Children must not be seen as victims, but they do face particular risks that must be recognized and addressed in policies and programs that seek to reduce the impacts of climate change.

Program and policy response

The first step in addressing this challenge is to ensure that there is quality, disaggregated information on the impacts of climate change on children. This will help to inform programs and policies to support adaptation, as well as bring the issue into the consciousness of governments and the public. Second, while children are one of the largest groups at risk from climate change, they are also an untapped resource in many countries in that they have a strong role to play in adaptation and risk reduction activities.

Save the Children implements child-centred disaster risk reduction activities in more than 30 countries around the world, and our experience shows time and time again the key role children play in identifying appropriate activities, designing how they should be implemented and getting communities and other children involved so the risks associated with disasters are reduced. These sorts of interventions need urgently to be scaled up to ensure that children themselves can be in the driving seat for their own adaptation to climate change.

Other examples of best-practice interventions that have proven experience in tackling the issues faced by children include direct distribution of cash and vouchers to the poorest people to tackle malnutrition and build resilience. Investment to ensure that health systems including hospitals and clinics are “climate-proofed”, so that they can withstand the impacts of climate change, is vital.

It will also be necessary to ensure that the international humanitarian system is fit for purpose, so that when national capacity to respond to a disaster is overwhelmed, international assistance moves quickly and effectively to reach the most-affected people.

At all times, it must be remembered that children have played little or no role in causing climate change. Yet they are the ones who will be hardest hit and will have to face its impacts in the years to come. We must all be ready to ensure that every child has the best chance of survival in a future altered by climate change.

- Third World Network Features