Latest news with #India2047:BuildingaClimate-ResilientFuture
The Hindu
26-05-2025
- Health
- The Hindu
Focus on heat-resilience despite the monsoon
At a national conference on climate and health titled 'India 2047: Building a Climate-Resilient Future', recently, a trade union leader shared the lived reality of garment workers in sweltering factories, while a climate modeller spoke about wet-bulb temperatures — two equally important perspectives that are reflective of science and the lived reality. The conference showed the power of unlikely collaborations: paediatricians with architects, maternal health experts with city engineers, and academicians with policymakers. The monsoon may have set in early, but the fact that cannot be ignored is that India did face (and will face) yet another season of intense heat; the toll on public health is impossible to ignore. From dehydration and heatstroke to exacerbated chronic illnesses, extreme heat is pushing the health system to its limits. Yet, our response remains siloed and heavily skewed toward crisis care (hospital beds, intravenous (IV) fluids, and emergency admissions) when it should be grounded in prevention. For India's health system to address the challenges of a warming world, it must evolve from reactive care to proactive and preventive action, and must also be interdisciplinary. Prevention begins with primary care India's primary health-care system is the first line of defence, but it is not climate ready. Professionals at health and wellness centres, primary health centres and frontline Accredited Social Health Activist (ASHA) workers are well-placed to act as heat-safety champions. With proper training and protocols, they can alert communities, check on vulnerable patients, and spread simple yet life-saving tips such as staying hydrated, avoiding midday exertion, and spotting early signs of heat stress. Linking early warning systems from meteorological departments to local health networks can trigger rapid community action. Imagine a heat alert triggering messages from ASHAs to village WhatsApp groups, door-to-door visits to elderly residents, and the distribution of hydration kits in advance. These actions have saved lives in cities such as Ahmedabad and have the potential to be scaled across rural India. Additionally, integrating prevention into routine chronic care is critical as people with heart disease, diabetes, kidney conditions, and mental health issues are especially vulnerable. During summer, clinicians must adjust medications, counsel patients on heat safety precautions, and closely monitor high-risk individuals. Clinical protocols must catch up Despite rising cases of heat-related illness, many health-care providers still do not screen for heat exposure in routine health checkups. Heat stroke is often misdiagnosed, or worse, missed entirely especially in busy emergency settings. We need clear, standardised clinical protocols for diagnosing and managing heat illnesses, along with regular summer drills in hospitals to ensure readiness. Dedicated 'heat corners' in emergency departments, pre-stocking of cooling kits at health centres, and post-discharge follow-ups for patients with heat illnesses are all simple but powerful steps towards a truly preventive approach. The heat-health crisis cannot be tackled by the health sector alone. Preventing illness is not just about treating symptoms. It means reducing exposure in the first place. This requires coordinated action across different sectors and disciplines. Urban planners must rethink housing design and public spaces. Water departments must ensure access to reliable supply during peak summer months. Labour departments need to enforce protections such as regulated outdoor working hours. Further, climate scientists must collaborate and work closely with health officials to guide timely, data-driven, targeted interventions. India should move beyond the model of 'centres of excellence' and build networks of excellence forming teams that bring together public health, climate science, urban development, labour rights, and grassroots voices. These networks can co-design solutions rooted in lived reality — from misting shelters in slums to cool roofing in Anganwadi centres. Health for all starts with equity Extreme heat is not just a weather event but is also a social injustice multiplier. When temperatures soar, it is the informal vendors on sizzling pavements, the children in cramped classrooms, and the elderly in poorly ventilated tenements who bear the brunt. When the heat index crosses danger thresholds, the most affected are people with no choice — waste pickers with no shelter or daily wagers working under tin roofs. 'Stay indoors' is not guidance to the vulnerable. It is a stark reminder of how deeply skewed our systems are. To prevent the worst health impacts of heat extremes, we must shift from reactive emergency care to preventive, equity-rooted public health. This begins with mapping vulnerability, not just meteorologically, but socially — who lives where, how he works and what he lacks. Early morning health checks during red alerts, mobile hydration stations in low-income zones, subsidised cool shelters for the homeless, and protective policies for outdoor workers are life-saving necessities. The science is clear. So is the moral imperative: climate resilience means nothing unless it protects those most at risk. The window for action is narrowing, but the path ahead is clear. As climate extremes intensify, India must seize this moment to lead with vision and urgency. By embedding heat resilience into our public health systems, anchored in equity, science, and local leadership, we can safeguard lives and livelihoods. The time to act is not tomorrow or next year. It is now. Let India be the country that chose to prepare, protect, and pioneer. Nitya Mohan Khemka is Director of the Khemka Foundation, focused on strategic philanthropy. Indu K. Murthy leads the Climate, Environment and Sustainability sector at the Center for Study of Science, Technology and Policy (CSTEP), a research-based think tank
Gulf Today
15-04-2025
- Science
- Gulf Today
Working towards a climate-resilient future
A recent conference 'India 2047: Building a Climate-Resilient Future' brought together leading experts in climate science, public health, medicine, labour, business, agriculture, and urban planning for a series of interdisciplinary dialogues on advancing climate resilience. The conference, according to its website, addressed the effects of extreme climatic events such as extreme heat intensifying across the Global South – particularly in India – with far-reaching impacts on the environment, economy, and society demanding urgent, evidence-based solutions. Startlingly, as an analysis in the ScienceAdviser pointed out, at this conference, scientists said that despite its extreme heat waves, the country's decades-long warming trend amounts to half the global average. The analysis goes on to highlight a surprising statistic. On a world map showing how 2024 temperatures deviated from a historical baseline, many countries were coloured deep red, denoting an increase of 1°C to 2°C. But one large, pale spot stood out in the tropics. As Indians gird themselves for what could be a third summer in a row of extreme heat, the analysis says, they might be surprised to hear their country is warming more slowly than many others. Last year, India saw its highest recorded temperature and its longest spell of heat waves. But annual mean temperatures have risen by less than 0.7°C since 1901—about half the global average. Scientists do not fully understand why. Key learnings from the conference were summarized by its Scientific Committee and put out on the conference website. The warming over the subcontinent over the next few decades is likely to be much faster than what has been experienced in the past. Rainfall will continue to become more intense, but more sporadic. Climate scientists can work together to improve weather and climate forecasts – of the onset of the monsoon, for example, or of peak temperatures during the pre-monsoon season. But there are limitations to their skill in predicting weather and climate, and surprises are inevitable. The takeaway lesson is that the country must begin to prepare for new conditions never seen before across the subcontinent – and that preparation must begin now. One way to prepare is to make sure that the forecasts from climate science are effective for the end-users, who have distinct needs and priorities. Preparing for climate change means developing forecasting tools that are customized to their specific contexts. And this will lead to more relevant and actionable plans for adaptation. In the health sector, the conference found that progress has been made in data collection, but significant unknowns remain regarding the liveability in extreme heat conditions. The current understanding of mortality and heat exposure at the city scale is crude, and there is a pressing need for more granular data to identify those most at risk, but experts know enough to guide sensible public health decisions already. Health data is fragmented but there are encouraging efforts across India to digitize and integrate health records. Discussion groups identified the key value of a timely census for accurate epidemiological estimates of climate impacts on health. In general, there is much uncertainty about long term health outcomes, since there are overlapping challenges that intersect in synergistic ways – a key example is nutrition, non-communicable diseases, and susceptibility to infectious diseases. Workers are already adapting to worsening heat conditions and have begun organizing in response to these challenges. However, discussants agreed that broader social dialogues between government entities, businesses, and labour groups remain a priority, and it is critical to include workers in the conversation. Sector-specific triggers could be considered to capture the full spectrum of worker impacts. More research is needed to understand worker-level heat exposure. Also, the built environment operates at multiple scales, including buildings, urban design, and urban planning. Policy, market forces, and education each play a crucial role in shaping climate-responsive infrastructure. Innovations and solutions must be contextualized in all the various contexts of India. Across groups, the conference sessions identified challenges associated with differing timescales of priorities, where long-term sustainability may be at odds with short-term needs. Experts at this convening included government, academia, civil society, and the private sector, aiming to foster collaboration, bridge critical knowledge gaps, and shape actionable research and policy frameworks for a sustainable and climate-resilient future.
