Resources
17 December 2025
Healthy people, healthy planet
Climate change poses direct and indirect threats to health. According to the Institute for Global Health in Barcelona, extreme heat caused more than 47,000 deaths in Europe in 2023. By 2050, the World Health Organization projects at least 250,000 additional deaths per year from climate-related diseases.
Low- and middle-income countries with weak health systems are particularly exposed to floods, heatwaves, the development of diseases and mental health disorders. There is an urgent need to strengthen and adapt these systems, while reducing their emission of greenhouse gases, improving energy efficiency and promoting healthy lifestyles. Health therefore represents a strategic lever for climate action in developing countries.
Health systems thus play a central role in addressing climate change. Enabel wants to ensure that health is a driving force of change in climate policies, by strengthening community resilience and supporting climate-resilient health systems. The agency also promotes actions with clear benefits for health – such as access to clean energy, healthy environments and sustainable urban development – at the intersection of climate justice and health equity.
Enabel’s climate-smart action in the health sector is structured around five key pillars and recommendations, presented in this position paper.
