Recommendations

Recommendation 1

Incorporating health into the climate narrative

The evidence presented throughout this report highlights a clear connection between human health and climate action. This year offers an unprecedented opportunity to improve the health of the planet and its people – and for the UK to take a lead. Following on from its upcoming Presidency of the UNFCCC Conference of Parties (COP26) (footnote 4), the UK Government has the opportunity to influence the incorporation of health within the climate narrative in future COP agendas.

The UK Government has a key role to promote a stronger focus on health within the international climate narrative, and advocate for this to be maintained going forwards. By integrating the protection and promotion of human health in all actions to address climate change in the UK and demonstrating the potential health gains of the net-zero transition, the UK can take a global leadership role.

Recommendation 2

Integrating climate adaptation and mitigation policies to benefit health

Well-designed actions to promote adaptation can also reduce negative health impacts of climate change. Whilst this report focuses on climate mitigation, we recognise that the synergies and trade-offs of climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies should be considered in tandem. Integrated approaches could amplify the co-benefits and manage the trade-offs.

To maximise the potential health benefits of climate action, greater efforts should be made to integrate climate adaptation and mitigation policies at national and local levels, to identify and address the potential trade-offs and potential unintended consequences on human health.

Recommendation 3

Developing metrics to assess health impacts

To fully realise potential health co-benefits, monitoring the health impacts of mitigation policies will be crucial in identifying possible trade-offs between climate action and health and any possible unintended consequences, including spillover effects and impacts on equity. However, systematic mechanisms to monitor these impacts across sectors are not yet in place. It will therefore be vital to ensure a robust set of metrics are both made available and integrated into policies. Improving the granularity of data will improve the value of some of these metrics, particularly at the local level, and among particular groups of people.

To properly harness the benefits of climate mitigation, there is an urgent need to robustly and regularly assess the health impacts of climate action. National and local governments, in collaboration with research teams and appropriate public health bodies, should prioritise the integration and refinement of standardised metrics to assess all mitigation policies. These should aim to capture the broad scope of potential health and societal impacts, including on equity, and work towards their use in the reporting and evaluation of all mitigation policies.

Recommendation 4

Promoting transdisciplinary systems approaches to address the complex interaction between climate change mitigation and health

Addressing climate and health in tandem is complex and crosses multiple sectors. Activities will require input across disciplines to better understand and address the complex interaction of climate change mitigation policies and health impacts in the context of national and global systems. Efforts currently being made by the UK healthcare systems to reach net-zero emissions across all three pillars of sustainability, via the Delivering a Net Zero NHS strategy, could stand as a useful case study for wider sectors, as an exemplar of working towards net-zero within a complex system.

To support such efforts, research design and implementation should reflect the complex nature of these issues. In doing so, it will be important that research looks to target and address areas with evidence and data gaps. These include potential direct and indirect health impacts; inequities in effects of emerging energy and food technologies and of policies that play a role in meeting the net-zero target; factors influencing both incremental and transformational behaviour change; and identifying areas for targeted interventions.

Research funders, led by UK Research and Innovation, should support a transdisciplinary systems approach in research design and implementation, to better understand the complex interaction of climate action and health across sectors.