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FIND statement at the plenary session on climate change and health- equity and one health during the 3rd G20 health working group meeting

Plenary session on climate change and health- equity and one health

Delivered by Krithika Raghavan, FIND, Senior Manager, Advocacy and Communications
5 June 2024, Salvador, Brazil

Thank you, Chair

Like many others today, FIND congratulates the Brazilian G20 Presidency for prioritizing the issue of climate change, health equity and one health.

Diagnostics are our first line of defense against emerging and re-emerging pathogens and are critical to delivering UHC. Therefore, any measures to mitigate the impact of climate change will fail without diagnostic-related interventions.

However, we do not have fit-for purpose diagnostics to detect and monitor many climate-impacted diseases and to deliver timely, accurate results, wherever people are seeking care. Many of these diseases are fueling the spread of AMR in humans, animals, agriculture and throughout the environment.

Over the past 20+ years, FIND has worked with partners to address unmet diagnostic needs for public health challenges like malaria, yellow fever, dengue and cholera that are being exacerbated by climate change. Based on our experience, we would like to highlight key measures to respond to climate-impacted health threats:

  • Investing in assessing the impact of climate change on disease prevalence, including due to changes in vector ecology and air quality, disruption in quality water supplies, and rising temperatures,
  • Investing in innovation, research and development of improved or adapted, climate-tolerant diagnostic tests,
  • Leveraging multiplex diagnostic platforms, genome sequencing and digital health tools to strengthen integrated surveillance systems across human, animal, agricultural and environmental samples,
  • Strengthening regional manufacturing capacity for diagnostics through mechanisms such as the Alliance on Local and Regional Production and Innovation, to mitigate the impact of climate-related supply chain disruptions, and
  • Creating systems to enable equitable access to testing, in line with the World Health Assembly resolution on climate change and health.

We urge the G20 to consider these recommendations during discussions on the Health Minister’s Declaration on Climate Change and Health Equity and on the One Health Approach.

Thank you.