Missed connections: Health, gender and the climate crisis

Every two minutes, a woman dies due to pregnancy or childbirth complications. Despite earlier progress, maternal mortality rates have now stagnated or even reversed in many regions of the world, with new risks emerging — most notably, climate change. 

During pregnancy, a woman is three times more likely to develop severe malaria, often fatally. As global temperature and rainfall patterns change, mosquitoes and other vectors that carry diseases are infecting new hosts in new places. Malaria is just one example of a disease that is not gender neutral, and a climate-related health risk.  

Gender-based health inequities in a changing climate 

The year 2024 was declared the hottest on record. As our climate changes, new health impacts are emerging — both directly from extreme heat, wildfires and floods, and indirectly through ecological and economic changes impacting health. Evidence shows that climate extremes affect women, girls and gender-diverse individuals uniquely, making them especially vulnerable to the health effects of climate change. These vulnerabilities are not due to biology alone, as factors including cultural norms, socio-economic status and location all act as multipliers that worsen health impacts. 

Evidence of gendered health impacts is growing, but incomplete 

While climate change affects us all, women make up 80% of people displaced by climate change and are 14 times more likely to die in a climate-related disaster. Other gendered health impacts include:  

• Reproductive health: Extreme heat can cause severe complications during pregnancy. If a pregnant woman experiences extreme heat, she is twice as likely to experience maternal death or stillbirth, exacerbated by disrupted health services and access during climate extremes. 
• Gender-based violence: Studies show increased rates of gender-based violence in the aftermath of climate disasters. Heat is linked to higher rates of assaults and sexual violence, and prolonged climate crises such as drought are associated with forms of gender-based violence, including childhood marriage. 
• Food security and nutrition: Gendered inequalities lead to increased risks for household food security and poor nutrition in the face of climate change. Women and girls bear greater responsibility for their families’ food, water and fuel, and face the greatest burdens when natural resources dwindle. 

Despite the emerging evidence, much remains unknown. Large data gaps still exist, compounded by weak or inconsistent sex- and gender-disaggregated data, particularly in low- and middle-income contexts. What is needed is a comprehensive climate and health research agenda that encompasses gender and intersectional evidence at the forefront, and not as an afterthought. 

Supporting research at the intersection of health, gender and climate in the Global South 

While awareness of and investments in the co-benefits of climate and health have increased, meaningful change will not be achieved without an approach that considers gender inequities, supported by context-specific data. Such evidence can be used to enable policy and practice change via:  

• promoting gender equity and leadership
• leveraging traditional and interdisciplinary knowledge
• centring gender in climate and health policies
• accessing climate finance for health co-benefits
• investing in climate-resilient health-care systems  

Research funders have a role to play in supporting more diverse and equitable research ecosystems, ensuring the research agenda is driven by and rooted in local realities. IDRC  programming supports research that embodies these values. Examples include: 

• Increasing investment in gender-responsive climate and health policies. An IDRC-supported United Nations Population Fund project aims to address insufficient understanding and integration of sexual and reproductive health in national climate policies.
• Supporting capacity-building for early-career researchers. An IDRC-supported project is enhancing research capacity on climate change and health through training tools on gender and intersectionality, led by the Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases co-sponsored by WHO, UNICEF, the UN Development Programme and the World Bank.  
• Supporting gender-transformative research on neglected tropical diseases. IDRC is supporting research by the Drugs for Neglected Diseases initiative to develop more inclusive treatment solutions for women affected by neglected vector-borne diseases.
• Enhancing global collaboration to generate evidence and best practices. IDRC and the United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office are supporting five regional hubs to enhance locally led research on climate and health. By focusing on gender and intersectionality, the hubs will contribute to more climate-resilient health care. 

Moving toward solutions to complex problems 

The complex, intertwined crises of climate change and health demand inclusive, grounded solutions. Now more than ever, support to Global South researchers is crucial to generate nuanced and timely evidence about risks and responses for populations that have traditionally been voiceless. Yet, with the heat, floods and fires that are already at our doorsteps, time is not on our side. Every minute counts.