Center for Climate, Health, and the Global Environment
We seek climate solutions that can provide for a healthier and more just world today and a livable future for our children.
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Children’s Health
Increased greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere are leading to higher temperatures, more intense storms, and lengthy droughts—all of which can deeply affect children’s health.
Why it matters
Kids are not little adults. Their health is impacted more directly by climate change. And research shows that children today will face around three times as many climate disasters as their grandparents did, including wildfires, storms, floods, and droughts.
Children’s immune systems and organs are still developing, and they eat and drink more for their size. They also breathe at a faster rate, increasing their exposure to dangerous air pollutants that can damage their lungs.
Climate change makes heat waves hotter and longer—and potentially dangerous for kids to play outside. This is a critical issue because the number one health challenge facing our children today is obesity. When they do spend time outdoors, it can lead to heat stress and greater exposure to disease-carrying insects like ticks and mosquitoes.
The health connection
Rising temperatures and decreased air quality affect kids by increasing asthma attacks and allergies, worsening pregnancy outcomes, creating food insecurity, increasing mental health problems, developmental delays, and changes in their genetic makeup.
A 2023 EPA report finds a variety of ways that children may be impacted by climate change. For example, at 2°C and 4°C of global warming:
- Childhood asthma incidence is projected to increase between 4% and 11%, respectively, due to changes in air quality.
- Children’s asthma-related emergency department visits are projected to increase from 17%-30% each year due to increases in pollen levels.
- Childhood cases of Lyme disease are projected to increase 79% to 241%, or an additional 2,600 to 23,400 new cases per year.
- Climate-driven heat is expected to impact school performance, leading to a 4% to 7% reduction in academic achievement each year and potentially impacting future income.
- Flooding is projected to cause 1-2 million+ children to temporarily be displaced or lose their homes.
Check out this video from The New England Journal of Medicine on the ways fossil fuels, air pollution, and climate change impact children’s health.
Diseases
- Warmer temperatures can allow insects that carry diseases to live in places where they couldn’t in the past.
- The blacklegged tick, which carries Lyme disease, has been expanding its northward range into Canada as annual temperatures warm.
- Mosquitoes that carry dengue, malaria, and zika are also expanding their range as temperatures rise and rainfall patterns change worldwide.
- Diseases spread through contaminated water and food may also be on the rise with more heavy rainfall that comes with climate change.
- Floods are associated with outbreaks of diarrheal diseases—which are particularly dangerous for infants and young children—and mold that grows in flooded homes can trigger allergies.
Air quality
- Air pollution accounts for 20% of newborn deaths worldwide, most related to complications of low birth weight and preterm birth.
- Thousands of children under the age of 5 die prematurely each year from lower respiratory infections caused by air pollution from burning fossil fuels.
- Carbon dioxide, which fuels climate change, also causes more pollen production in plants that trigger seasonal allergies. Warming has also led to earlier springs and longer growing seasons for many allergenic plants.
- Hot temperatures lead to more ground level ozone, a pollutant that causes asthma attacks in children. Ozone is produced when chemicals released from burning fossil fuels are exposed to sunlight and heat.
- Hot, dry weather can fuel forest fires, creating harmful air pollutants and damaging agriculture. These fires are likely to become more common in the 21st century due to the effects of climate change.
Mental health
- Children can experience trauma from major storms and fires. They can destroy homes, uproot families, and disrupt education by damaging or destroying schools, which can lead to higher rates of anxiety and post-traumatic stress. That stress can lead to illnesses later in life like heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure, and cognitive decline.
- Children may be more likely to feel anxious or depressed when they are confronted with the prospect of climate change— either in the form of extreme weather or just the knowledge of climate change itself.
Equity and health benefits of climate action
Actions that curtail the use of fossil fuels like coal, oil and natural gas, can substantially improve air quality and provide immediate and localized benefits to children’s health.
The bottom line
Children deserve every opportunity to reach their full potential, but climate change puts their health at risk. This is especially so for disadvantaged children whose health may already be vulnerable. As weather patterns change and temperatures rise, so do the spread of vector-borne diseases, harmful air pollutants, and food insecurity that affect our health.
Businesses, government officials, and communities should recognize these connections and incorporate information on the health benefits of climate mitigation into their decision-making so we can better care for children, implement solutions to climate change, and grow our economy.
Resources
How can I do my part to take action against climate change?
Climate change can feel overwhelming, but the good news is we already have solutions to improve the health of your child and children all over the world. The same actions we take to curb climate change also have immediate health benefits.
Here are simple steps you can take:
- Educate yourself. Learn about environmental justice and how systemic racism and other forms of oppression lead to some children bearing a higher burden from climate change. Share resources with your community.
- Plant trees and other vegetation where you live, and encourage your community to do the same. Trees provide shade to help you stay cool on hot days. Adding trees and other vegetation to your neighborhood can also help improve the air quality where you live, especially in urban areas, and can improve mental health. Some types of plants can cause more pollen in the air, so check with the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology’s guide to plant selection to learn which plants are safer for people with allergies.
- Choose walking, biking or public transit whenever possible, and consider carpooling. If you are buying a car, choose an electric car or find one with better fuel economy. The more gas a car burns per mile, the more harmful air pollution it generates. Getting exercise may also help improve a child’s mental health.
- Reduce, reuse, and recycle. A timeless piece of advice. The more we buy new, the greater our carbon footprint.
- Invest in energy efficiency and renewable energy. Ask your local leaders to invest in renewable energy in public buildings, and support building regulations that require solar panels and energy-saving policies for new buildings. Conserving energy saves money and reduces our carbon footprint.
- Start a conversation. Talk to your family and friends about climate change to make sure they know it’s a health issue, especially for our children, and that we need to work with everyone to take action to fight this climate crisis. Work with your place of worship and in your children’s school to see what you can do to spread the word and keep our kids healthy, and get involved in climate change planning at the state and local level.
- Get involved. Many towns and cities want to decarbonize and become more resilient to climate change—in fact they’re leading on this issue—and parents can play a role in shaping those efforts. Ask local leaders if your community has a climate action plan, and how your neighborhood can become safer and healthier by making it greener, more walkable and bike-friendly. You can ask decisionmakers to add green space by planting trees, increase access to public transit, create policies for healthy school environments, and invest in electric vehicle infrastructure. These actions will benefit everyone’s health and especially the health of our children.
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