It's no secret that when disaster strikes, children are often the most vulnerable. While child mortality rates have improved over the years, experts now think that emerging dangers linked to climate change could reverse the positive trend, according to Health Policy Watch.
What's happening?
UNICEF, the United Nations International Children's Emergency Fund, published a report titled "A Threat to Progress" earlier this year. It details how the effects of a changing climate impact children's health and well-being, from pregnancy to adolescence.
In the report, the agency explained how heat waves, polluted air, and other climate-related disasters are particularly hard on kids. The severity depends on the wealth, gender, location, and health status of children — all factors beyond their control.
"We suffer the most," said Francisco, a 14-year-old child advocate in Somalia working with UNICEF, per Health Policy Watch. "Children have dreams about the future, but they are losing hope because of climate change."
The agency recognized the toll on kids' mental health on top of their physical stressors. It also emphasized that the health impacts compound when dangers overlap, especially if any of five "multipliers" are present: water scarcity and contamination, food insecurity and contamination, infrastructural damage, service disruption, and displacement.
Why is child safety important?
"The true measure of success or failure in addressing climate change lies not solely in temperature metrics, but rather in the tangible reduction of child mortality and morbidity," UNICEF said in the report.
According to the agency, child mortality for children under 5 years old improved between 1990 and 2022, from 93 deaths to 37 deaths per 1,000 live births.
However, as the report found, the threats to that progress are encroaching.
Heat waves currently touch the lives of 559 million children, and with global temperatures rising, UNICEF predicts that number will pass 2 billion by 2050, with infants being especially at risk.
A hotter planet also worsens the spread of diseases like malaria and dengue, exacerbates illnesses like asthma, and increases pregnancy complications like preterm births, low birth weight, and stillbirths, as per the UNICEF report.
UNICEF also said that 953 million kids are affected by water stress, which also affects access to food.
Extreme weather disasters are also rising, and over the past six years, they caused a daily average of 20,000 children to be displaced. On top of injuries, those events also fuel malnutrition, which underlies half of the deaths of children under 5, according to the agency.
What's being done to protect kids around the world?
The report called for swift action from world leaders and governments, starting with meeting the Paris Agreement's 1.5°C temperature cutoff by slashing pollution. It also stressed the importance of supporting better access to food, water, and health care around the world. Above all, the agency called for elected officials and policymakers to center child welfare in their actions.
"We cannot allow our children to inherit a damaged and unsafe planet," said Dr. Helena Clements, officer for climate change at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, to Health Policy Watch.
"These issues are not just future threats; they are current realities impacting our children today," she added.
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