June Round-Up

London Climate Action Week sweltered under the very crisis it sought to address, while SB64 in Bonn left the difficult questions unanswered again.

Taran Deol

Jun 30, 2026

London Climate Action Week & extreme heat

London Climate Action Week Foiled by Climate Change, WIRED
As record-breaking heat crushes Europe, organizers moved events online to avoid exposing people to dangerously high temperatures. Europe is currently enveloped by an area of slow-moving high-pressure air. This traps warm air like a “lid on a pot” and creates a “heat dome” which blocks other weather fronts, like clouds and rain, from moving through.
The world agrees climate is a health issue. Now comes the hard part, Devex
At a Devex Impact House event during London Climate Action Week, experts from WHO and Wellcome said the climate and health agenda is gaining momentum, but funding and fragmented systems remain major barriers.
LSHTM researchers bring health and equity perspectives to London Climate Action Week, LSHTM News
A central theme of LSHTM’s program this year is the importance of inclusive and community-led responses to climate change. Discussions ranged from community owned climate action, and strengthening resilience alongside gender equity, to planetary health.
Nexa Fund will invest in solutions to reduce the health harms from extreme heat, air pollution, and changing mosquito diseases, Grand Challenges Canada
A new $50 million fund on climate and health was launched at the London Climate Action Week. The NEXA fund will invest in solutions to reduce the health harms from extreme heat, air pollution, and changing mosquito diseases. Of the total, up to $2 million will support projects across Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean.
Europe’s heatwave linked to 1,300 deaths, WHO says, as Germany hits record 41.7C, BBC
As millions of people across the continent are currently living under extreme heat, deaths continue to rise, schools are shut, and grids are buckling. The conditions have become deadlier than America’s gun violence.
New Regional Initiative Strives to Advance Heat Adaptation Across South Asia, NRDC
A consortium of leading South Asian research, policy, and development organizations recently launched the South Asia Hub of the Global Heat Health Information Network. This new initiative will help to advance evidence generation, policy analysis, and action across the region to address intensifying heat-health hazards.

Bonn Climate Meeting & measuring adaption efforts

Climate and Health Integration Takes Centre Stage at Bonn Meetings, Cool Coalition
Pathfinder Initiative at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, C40 Cities, the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology and the Government of Somalia hosted a side event in Bonn ahead of COP31, examining how integrated sectoral action can strengthen NDC and NAP implementation, using sustainable cooling to illustrate the link between mitigation, adaptation and health.
SB64: Health Community Calls on Bonn Climate Meeting to Triple Adaptation Finance, Global Climate & Health Alliance
During SB 64, the health sector called on rich countries to clearly state their plans to develop national energy transition roadmaps for transitioning away from fossil fuels, to reduce emissions, strengthen energy security and build resilience.
Bonn Climate Change Conference, Summary report, 8–18 June 2026, International Institute for Sustainable Development
It appeared as if developed countries and developing countries had different agendas for SB64, as the former pushed for a technical task force on developing indicators to track the Global Goal on Adaptation, ignoring calls by developing countries to triple adaptation finance. Other negotiations on the Mitigation Work Programme, and just transition, remained especially fraught.
Understanding the Global Goal on Adaptation: Framework and broader Architecture, SLYCAN Trust
This technical briefing offered a concise overview of the current state of GGA negotiations (published before the climate meetings in Bonn), including summarized information on how Parties, experts, and other actors have been working to develop indicators and address a range of cross-cutting and emerging issues.
Six global indicators with real-world impact, Office for National Statistics
The UK’s ONS concluded a four-year exercise helping establish global standards for measuring climate-health interactions. The resulting SOSCHI methods allow countries to use consistent approaches for tracking climate-related illness and death, filling a critical data gap and enabling international comparisons. At a moment when GGA indicator negotiations remain contested, SOSCHI offers a credible methodological floor for the more complex indicator work still to come.

Equity, vulnerability, & the Global South

A threat to health inclusivity: climate change exacerbates health exclusion, The Economist
Through a global survey of over 42,000 people across 40 countries, research found people in LMICs are more affected by climate change in more immediate and measurable ways, marginalized populations face compounding climate-health impacts, and the younger generation is more concerned about a future defined by climate change than older generations.
Health and climate justice for small and island nations, Nature
Small island developing states face disproportionate climate-health burdens despite minimal contributions to emissions; the piece argues for reparative financing and governance reforms that center frontline nations in global climate-health decision-making.
Lessons in resilience: what health workers in Africa, Asia, and Latin America know and do in response to worsening climate change impacts on their communities, The Geneva Learning Foundation
Frontline health workers in low-resource settings are developing adaptive practices largely invisible to global health systems; the report surfaces this tacit knowledge as an underutilized asset for climate-resilient health.
Children’s Climate Risk Report (2026), Unicef
Updates Unicef’s landmark risk index, tracking which children are most exposed to climate shocks and least protected by health and social systems; findings reinforce that climate change is first and foremost a children’s rights crisis.
African Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Health Systems & Facilities: New Course Announcement from the Mailman School of Public Health, Columbia University
New professional training designed to build capacity among African health system managers to plan, design, and operate facilities that can withstand escalating climate hazards.
Climate Action for Health: A policy guide for co-benefits in the Western pacific region, WHO
Frames climate mitigation as a health investment in the Western Pacific by mapping co-benefits — cleaner air, reduced non-communicable disease burden — achievable through sectoral decarbonization, particularly in energy and transport.

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