Climate Change

Climate change is leading to increasing frequency and/or intensity of a wide variety of natural hazards that have historically led to disaster, including wildfires, heat waves, tropical cyclones, extreme weather, heavy rainfall and flooding, and impacts on food insecurity and population mobility that can contribute to complex humanitarian emergencies. Simultaneously, sea level rise, poleward movement of the locus of maximum intensity of tropical cyclones, expansion of areas affected by drought and aridification, and other spatial translocation of other hazards increasingly expose new populations to disaster risk.

Disaster risk reduction in the context of climate change requires consideration of projected future conditions and actions to prepare for as-yet-unseen impacts in new locations. It also calls for consideration of a wide range of mitigation actions, which may range from actions to address the root causes of climate change to actions to shift population concentrations away from settings that are expected to experience increasingly hazardous conditions in future years. As a result, climate change will challenge the architecture of disaster and emergency medicine, and its increasing impacts call for a thoughtful, proactive response from the disaster and emergency medicine community.

Climate Change SIG Leadership

Caleb Dresser, MD, MPH

Co-Chair

Assistant Professor, Emergency Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Assistant Professor, Environmental Health, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health

Satchit Balsari, MD, MPH

Co-Chair

Associate Professor, Emergency Medicine, Harvard Medical School

Associate Professor, Global Health and Population, Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health

Latoya Storr, MBBS

Secretary

Emergency Medicine Consultant, Rand Memorial Hospital

Mission, Purpose, and Goals

Mission: The mission of the Climate Change SIG is to create a forum for education, research, collaboration, and innovation on steps to prevent, prepare for, and respond to climate change impacts in the study and practice of disaster and emergency medicine.

Purpose: The purpose of the Climate Change SIG is to:

Provide a focal point for innovation that addresses climate change throughout the disaster cycle;
Foster collaboration between disaster medicine professionals and experts on climate change and its implications for natural hazards and disaster preparedness;
Enhance educational opportunities for disaster professionals seeking to learn more about the implications of climate change in this field;
Increase awareness of the implications of climate change for long-term disaster preparedness and risk reduction worldwide; and
Create a forum for developing a research agenda and ongoing research on the implications of climate change for disaster preparedness and response.

Goals: The goals of the Climate Change SIG are to:

Educate disaster medicine professionals on the implications of climate change;
Foster research projects that address the implications of climate change for disaster medicine;
Provide a forum in which disaster medicine professionals concerned about climate change can connect with one another;
Support the development of policy recommendations that can support disaster risk reduction efforts and initiatives in the context of climate change; and
Integrate information on the implications of climate change into existing WADEM materials and guidelines as appropriate.