Staff Reporter :
Bangladesh has warned of a rapidly growing disparity between the health adaptation funding it needs and the support it receives from international partners, cautioning that the country’s capacity to shield its population from climate-driven health threats is reaching a breaking point.
Md Ziaul Haque, additional director general of the Department of Environment and a member of Bangladesh’s COP30 delegation, raised the alarm at a press conference in Belém, Brazil, on Tuesday, marking Health Day at COP30.
The event-titled “Putting Health at the Centre of Adaptation Finance”-was jointly hosted by Regions4, the Global Climate and Health Alliance, and Carbon Copy.
Speaking at the briefing, Ziaul Haque pressed the global community to deliver on its climate finance commitments to Bangladesh to help confront this escalating crisis.
“Our Health National Adaptation Plan identifies the real challenges, builds capacity, and aims to make the best use of our limited resources,” he said. “But in reality, the funding we receive for health adaptation is nowhere near adequate.
The gap between our needs and the support we get is vast.”
He noted that although health was formally included in the COP agenda in 2013, meaningful progress has remained limited.
Ziaul Haque called on multilateral institutions to put forward concrete and comprehensive proposals that reflect the scale of the global health challenge.
Climate and health experts at the briefing stressed that climate change is becoming one of the gravest threats to human well-being, with health systems around the world already overwhelmed and poorly equipped to cope with worsening climate impacts.
Dr Marina Romanello, executive director of the Lancet Countdown, said, “More than half a million people die every year due to extreme heat, and over 150,000 deaths are caused by exposure to wildfire smoke.
Health systems are already overstretched and underfunded, and most countries are far from prepared for what lies ahead.”
She added that only 44% of countries have calculated their health adaptation needs, creating a massive global financing deficit.
Delegates from Chile, Nigeria, India, and the COP30 Presidency pointed out that the crisis in health financing is part of a far broader shortfall in overall adaptation funding.
The 2025 Adaptation Gap Report estimates that developing nations will need $310-365 billion annually by 2035 to withstand climate impacts. Yet the global community is still grappling to mobilise even the $40 billion committed under the Glasgow Pact.
Carlos Lopes, Special Envoy for Africa for the COP30 Presidency, noted, “The shortfall in health financing is staggering. Most efforts are being funded domestically. International support must be scaled up drastically and serve as complementary assistance.”
According to UNEP, only 4% of multilateral adaptation finance from 2019 to 2023 went to the health sector. A separate Adelphi study found that just 0.5% of all multilateral climate finance supports health-focused initiatives.
The latest Lancet Countdown report, published last month, reveals a steep rise in climate-related deaths. Extreme heat, flooding, erratic rainfall, storms, and desertification are placing unprecedented strain on communities and health systems worldwide.
Against this backdrop, world leaders have gathered in Belém-widely referred to as both the “Adaptation COP” and the “Implementation COP”-with expectations of concrete progress, especially in health adaptation.
Representatives from India and Nigeria underscored the need for bold investment. Dr Vishwas Chitale, Fellow at the Council for Energy, Environment & Water, India, and Research Fellow at the UN, said India will require $643 billion for adaptation by 2030.
From Nigeria, Oden Ewa reported that adaptation finance met only 6% of its health sector needs in 2021-22, despite rising disease risks linked to extreme heat and intense rainfall.
Speakers welcomed the establishment of the new Climate and Health Funders Coalition and its pledge of $300 million, though experts cautioned that far greater commitments are essential.
“Safeguarding health must be the foundation of climate adaptation,” said Jeni Miller, executive director of the Global Climate and Health Alliance. “The world is only beginning to realise how critical this is.”
