Why is the REACT consortium needed?
The climate crisis is the biggest threat to human health. Extreme weather events are affecting people emotionally and physically and that situation will worsen. The WHO estimates that between 2030 and 2050, climate change will cause around 250,000 additional deaths per year.
The climate crisis is also impacting on people’s ability to access health care and health systems’ ability to provide services. We need health systems that can withstand climate shocks and stresses, and the health workforce is an important part of that response.
Why focus on health workers?
Health workers are well-positioned to talk to people about the climate crisis, to act to protect health and to respond to health needs. However, we know that health workers do not have enough knowledge about climate crisis and its impact on health, and the conditions in which they work are not helpful, eg high workloads, lack of leadership, absence of climate crisis in local health plans, lack of support to guide their responses, fear of reprisals if they speak out about climate crisis, and inadequate funding for implementing effective adaptation measures.
REACT is working to strengthen the responsiveness of the health workforce against health impacts of climate crisis in Nepal and Zimbabwe – countries with a diverse range of climate challenges. We are engaging with stakeholders to ensure that health workers in our two study countries have the relevant knowledge, skills and support to respond to the challenge. More on those study sites here.
Our objectives and study stages
The REACT study has four main stages:
1
To assess the preparedness and ability of health system actors to respond to climate crisis-related health impacts.
We will conduct a series of reviews and surveys at our study sites in Nepal and Zimbabwe including:
- a scoping review on the climate crisis impact on health and determinants of the health workforces’ responsiveness,
- a policy analysis on content, actors, context and processes that influence the health workforces’ resilience to climate crisis,
- qualitative studies to explore perceptions on climate crisis and the health workforces’ resilience, and
- surveys of health facilities, health workers, and communities to understand knowledge and practices about climate crisis. The surveys will form the baseline of our intervention evaluation.
2
To co-create context sensitive and gender equitable interventions to improve the resilience of the health workforce and communities to climate crisis-related health impacts
Our findings from stage 1 will inform our co-creation process. Working with the health workforce and local communities in our study sites, we will devise interventions to improve local resilience to climate crisis. Possible interventions include training, performance management, establishing safe working environments, and strengthening links between communities and health workers.
3
To pilot those co-created interventions and evaluate them for equity, feasibility, effectiveness, costs, sustainability and scalability.
We will pilot and refine the interventions through qualitative studies, including the use of participatory action research. Intervention development and implementation will be costed in detail and an endline survey conducted to determine the impact on health worker and community knowledge on climate crisis and health.
4
To promote uptake of learning on climate crisis and health among health systems actors and researchers
Our findings will be widely shared with policy makers, managers, heath workers, community representatives and researchers.
This will all be under-pinned by extensive training and capacity strengthening for all REACT partners. This will include four PhDs and 4 MScs, and extensive organisational strengthening, boosting CeSHHAR and HERD capacity for financial and project management and governance. Our community partners are also included through our citizen science approach which will training community members to conduct research.