1.2.3 Incorporating climate change into the healthcare curriculum

In a survey of 2817 medical schools in 112 countries (El Omrani et al., 2020), only 15% had incorporated climate change into the curriculum. There were student-led climate-related activities in an additional 12% of medical schools, suggesting that students themselves appreciate the connection between health and climate, even when it’s not a priority for educators. 89% of medical schools did not include air pollution within their curriculum – and this was the case even in countries like India and China, where air pollution is a significant concern for health.

Anåker, Spante and Elf (2021) interviewed 12 nursing students at a Swedish university about their perceptions of climate change. They found that some students were aware of the impacts of climate change on health, including how it can exacerbate inequalities. While some of the nursing students felt they could play an active role in mitigating climate change, including managing clinical waste appropriately or acting as role models, others hadn’t made this connection.

A global online survey of institutions training health professionals found that over 70% of them encountered barriers and challenges when trying to incorporate climate change into the curriculum (Shea, Knowlton and Shaman, 2020), including:

• lack of time to develop the curriculum
• lack of funding
• competing institutional priorities
• lack of available space in the curriculum
• lack of teaching materials and staff expertise.

It is important that all healthcare education supports students to understand the links between climate and health. A priority area is the education of professionals providing mental health support. A paper co-authored by 23 young people from fifteen countries (Diffey et al., 2022) explains how, with appropriate training and once they have explored their own feelings about the climate crisis, professionals, such as counsellors, psychiatrists and psychologists, are better placed to support the clients and communities they work with. They can then actively challenge the myth that anxiety or depression about the state of the world is abnormal.

Of course, not all healthcare is provided by healthcare workers. Much is provided by people themselves or their families. Everyone needs to understand the links between climate change and health, and these can be taught through multiple disciplines.