Climate and Health

The world is heating up, and this has a direct impact on humanity, changing the way our bodies function, the environments they function in, and the wellbeing of our societies. 

We can no longer stop climate change from happening, but we can take steps to protect communities and prevent it from getting worse. 

We want to live in a healthier world – one in which governments are fully equipped to tackle this global emergency with the urgency it requires. 

To do this, we are funding research into the impacts of climate change on human health, and using it to advocate for change.  

Climate and health refers to the impacts of climate change on human health.  

Higher temperatures and extreme weather events, such as heatwaves and flash flooding, directly cause illness and death.   

However, climate change is also driving shifts in the distribution of infectious diseases, as well as reducing food supplies, leaving millions of people undernourished.  

Many communities are already adapting to protect people from the harmful effects of climate change, and many more will be affected by it in the future.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), climate change is the single greatest threat to humanity and its impact is already causing serious harm. 

There are significant gaps in scientific understanding of how to prevent further changes to the climate while protecting health at the same time. We also need tools to predict the future effects of climate change on human health.  

To fill these gaps, the field of climate and health research needs better resourcing. We need to increase collaborative research between experts in different scientific disciplines, as well as recognise the need to prioritise work in the communities most affected by climate change.  

Mitigations – ways to slow temperature rises – and adaptions – how we protect populations already being harmed by climate change – will be more successful if they are informed by rigorous evidence of the impacts they have on health.  

We aim to make meaningful and measurable progress to the climate and health field and to contribute to wider mitigation initiatives.  

We hope these studies will provide the evidence key decision makers use to make science-informed choices when creating policy related to climate change and human health. 

We’re looking to fund better and faster ways to collect and share information about the impact climate change has on human health around the world, at national, regional, and global levels. 

This evidence must be tailored to the needs of specific regions, countries, and communities, so that it is of practical use to decision makers at all levels of governance.  

We want to focus on: quantitative data on the effects of climate change on health; identifying the benefits of climate change mitigation, such as reducing gas emissions; establishing evidence on adaption actions; and creating a global climate health community. 

Wellcome also funds discovery research in a broad range of disciplines, including climate and health.

How is Wellcome funded? 

The Wellcome Trust is an independent charity. To find out where we get our grant funding from, visit our investments page.