The humanitarian aid organization Doctors Without Borders (MSF) says the impact of climate change is having devastating effects on its workers.
A major humanitarian organization has revealed how the climate change is delivering a “double whammy” to attempts to save lives, as it multiplies the health risks and makes the humanitarian interventions sean more difficult and complex to carry out.
In a new report, Doctors Without Borders (MSF) has revealed how aid workers and communities are coping adapt to the multiple and complex straight of climate change.
Much is known about the harmful effects of the climate crisis on human health, but until now, there has been relatively little attention little attention to the problems those faced by humanitarian workers who help those who suffer.
The report, titled ‘A Hostile Climate: Tackling the Challenges of Aid Delivery in the Context of Climate Change’, is the result of a collaboration between MSF’s Humanitarian Action for Climate and Environment Initiative and the Institute of Health. Heidelberg University Global. Shows the straight those faced by workers humanitarian workers from MSF, together with patients and the communities.
The researchers spoke with 49 humanitarian workers from 30 countries from around the world and discovered how they experience and respond to a rapidly changing environment.
In their conclusionsshed light on the fact that various climate riskssuch as changes in water availability and quality, as well as food shortages, are closely linked linked to global warming y rapidly amplify humanitarian needs.
How does climate change affect the tasks of humanitarian workers?
MSF explains that the climate change this testing the ability of humanitarian workers to respond effectively to the needs of at-risk communities for multiple reasons.
Some of the most significant are the creation of additional logistical obstaclesfor humanitarian responseboth by damaging infrastructure and supply chain disruptions and by creating conditions that can be dangerous to mental and physical health.
“In March 2022 there was Cyclone Gombe here, which created big problems at the community level,” explains an MSF aid worker in Mozambique. “Some communities were isolated, and the MSF team was confined to one place. The bridges had collapsedso we couldn’t move the team from one region to another“.
However, the report reveals that MSF is determined not to let climate change get in the way of its important work, and the organization is already doing great progress. In fact, the organization’s teams around the world are beginning to adapt to the crisis along with the communities in which they work.
The report reveals the stories of humanitarian workers and How are they changing their modus operandi?‘ in the face of adversity. But what do these alterations consist of?
“I think we have the chance of… perfect our way of working“explains an MSF humanitarian worker in Switzerland. “In Madagascar, for example, doing emergency preparedness based on data and surveillancenot just infectious diseases, but things like rainfall or crop yields, and food insecurity and malnutrition, rather than waiting for children to start showing up with severe acute malnutrition.”
Other plans include raising awareness, anticipatory action, increasing resilience and fostering collaboration.
“The response is not up to the needs”
While it is true that MSF is adapting to the many problems caused by climate change, the report also reveals that, in general, adaptation measures remain quite limited in scale and scope within MSF and in broader communities. This is partly due to the magnitude of the impact (current and future) of the crisis.
“Many communities and organizations they remain vulnerable to increasing risks that raises the climate changebecause the response is not up to the needs,” says Léo Lysandre Tremblay, director of MSF’s Climate and Environment Humanitarian Action Initiative and co-author of the report.
“This underlines the importance of a more ambitious action to reduce risk, increase preparation and protect people and communities from the impacts of climate change,” he adds.
An MSF spokesperson explains that the report was carried out in order to better understand how humanitarian workerspatients and MSF communities experience y respondents al climate changeand to raise awareness about the struggles that so many people face.
“MSF shares its findings in the hope that they will help other organizations to reflect on the health impacts of climate change in their practice, since identify strategies and actions to minimize the impacts of climate-related health threats,” they say.
