What's happened
The Lancet Countdown shows health harms from climate change have grown since the Paris Agreement. Heat-related deaths rose globally, with 2023 linked to 710,000 deaths and drought affecting half the world’s land in 2025. Clean energy investment rose, but fossil fuels still dominate energy supply. Experts call for placing health at the centre of climate decisions ahead of Cop31.
What's behind the headline?
- The Lancet Countdown provides a multi-faceted view of how climate change is affecting health, emphasizing a health-centric approach to policy.
- The data links 2023 heat deaths to human-caused climate change and highlights regional economic impacts, notably in Southeast Asia and Africa.
- The report calls for formal recognition of climate change as a global health emergency and stresses the need for cohesive, long-term resilience.
- The shifting groundwater patterns and droughts emphasize systemic risks to food security and sanitation.
- The story underscores the tension between rapid gains in clean energy investment and the continued dominance of fossil fuels in energy mix, with health implications driving urgency.
How we got here
The Lancet Countdown, led by UCL and WHO, tracks 54 indicators on health, heat, air quality, disease transmission, energy, adaptation, funding, and regulation. The 2025 drought and groundwater shifts underscore threats to food security and sanitation, while 2025 energy investments show a push toward clean energy despite fossil fuel dominance.
Our analysis
The Ecologist; Arab News; Bloomberg cite Lancet Countdown findings. The Ecologist highlights 2023 heat deaths and 2025 droughts; Arab News emphasizes the health emergency framing and economic costs; Bloomberg provides context around data access limitations in the US and overall coverage. All sources note ongoing COP31 context and calls for prioritizing health in climate policy.
Go deeper
- What concrete steps are governments taking to place health at the center of climate policy?
- How will COP31 influence funding for health-focused climate resilience?
- Which regions are most at risk and what local actions are recommended?
More on these topics
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Paris - Capital of France
Paris is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,150,271 residents as of 2020, in an area of 105 square kilometres.
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Paris Agreement
The Paris Agreement is an agreement within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, dealing with greenhouse-gas-emissions mitigation, adaptation, and finance, signed in 2016.
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World Health Organization
The World Health Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for international public health. The WHO Constitution, which establishes the agency's governing structure and principles, states its main objective as "the attainment