Ensuring impacts on health are prioritized in climate change discussions hasn’t always been an easy sell in a discussion that was long dominated by imagery of melting icebergs and starving polar bears.
But in recent years, the conversation has broadened beyond the environmental impacts of climate change — bringing greater visibility to the human health tolls such as cholera outbreaks, the impact of extreme heat on pregnant mothers and babies, natural disaster-battered clinics, and malnourished children.
In 2023, the United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP28, in Dubai hosted the annual event’s first dedicated Health Day. Brazil, the host of this year’s COP30 in November, has also committed to elevating the issue. Last year, the country faced the largest dengue outbreak in its history — a disease that thrives on heavy rainfall, humidity, and rising temperatures — and had historic flooding that displaced more than half a million people.
About the author
Sara Jervingsarajerving
Sara Jerving is a Senior Reporter at Devex, where she covers global health. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, VICE News, and Bloomberg News among others. Sara holds a master's degree from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism where she was a Lorana Sullivan fellow. She was a finalist for One World Media's Digital Media Award in 2021; a finalist for the Livingston Award for Young Journalists in 2018; and she was part of a VICE News Tonight on HBO team that received an Emmy nomination in 2018. She received the Philip Greer Memorial Award from Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 2014.
