Conflict, climate change and public health

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The ninth 2025 global report of The Lancet on health and climate change was released on Oct. 29, 2025. The Lancet Countdown, an annual indicator report led by University College London and produced in strategic partnership with the World Health Organization (WHO), represents the work of 128 leading experts from 71 academic institutions and UN agencies globally. Published ahead of the 30^th UN Conference of the Parties (COP), the report provides the most comprehensive assessment to date of the connections between climate change and health, including new metrics which record deaths from extreme heat and wildfire smoke, the coverage of urban blue spaces (rivers, lakes and coastlines), health adaptation funding and individual engagement with health and climate change.

Andrew Linke, associate professor in the School of Environment, Society & Sustainability at the University of Utah, co-authored a section of the study focused on how climate change and health intersect with armed conflict.

“It isn’t that the adverse effects of climate change cause violence directly, it’s that climate change is one part of a constellation of factors that contribute to cycles of political instability with impacts upon the provision of or access to healthcare,” Linke said.