2 weeks Ago
The climate crisis, once seen as a distant, slow-moving threat, has become one of the most pressing global challenges of our time. The earth is being redefined by rising temperatures, changing weather patterns, and an increase in the frequency of natural disasters. The effects are felt on every corner of the planet.
While most focus on how climate change will transform ecosystems, economies, and communities, equally, but often overlooked, is the impact it has on mental health—critical and profound. But now it seems increasingly clear that the psychological or mental health implications of the climate crisis are not just a secondary effect arising from the impacts of extreme weather and sea-level rise or flooding but rather a psychological burden loaded onto individuals and communities. An increased awareness of this kind of association makes it clearer and emphasises the need to recognise mental health as part and parcel of climate resilience.
For those directly exposed to the climate crisis, the psychological impacts could be real-time and overwhelming. The mental stress resulting from losing houses, livelihoods, or loved ones may be crushing for flood-sensitive areas, wildfire-sensitive regions, or hurricane-exposed areas. It could soon spread into acute stress and anxiety or develop into more chronic conditions in the form of depression or post-traumatic stress disorder.
These impacts are highly exacerbated in people who experience successive or recurrent disasters as one event superposes upon another, leading to the accumulation of the psychological burden. However, the mental health impacts of the climate crisis go beyond those at risk of immediate danger. The realisation that there is a changing climate in fact produces a sense of impending doom, and this feeling is growing all around.
This is often termed eco-anxiety and spreads around the globe, not only among victims near areas undergoing severe climate-related incidents. To this end, it allows young people to access knowledge that has resulted in the world being propelled into potentially irreversible changes based on the environment, enhancing feelings of helplessness, fear, and grief of inheriting a world much more fragile than ever. Eco-anxiety is not a clinical diagnosis, although it is accepted as a legitimate emotional response to the sheer scale of the climate crisis.
It comes from uncertainty and the feeling of losing control regarding what the future has in store for the survival of humanity on earth. This introduces the question of self-worth or value connected to planning and working toward long-term goals, like marriage, children, or career security, when the planet one lives on is apparently threatened. It creates a feeling of impotence, which can be so intense and pervasive that it impacts one's ability to function and perform in the everyday sense and impairs quality of life.
The climate crisis has a tendency to create and augment existing disparities in society, posing severe mental health risks and side effects, especially in low-income or developing countries. These societies usually suffer from climatic disasters and do not have the resources and money to rebuild, thereby causing both physiological and psychological distress. Unless suitable care is provided for mental health, people are more likely to face long-term impacts.
Even in good economies, mental health systems are under pressure to address the continually rising challenge of climate-related anxiety and stress. Many have kept quiet, carrying their suffering silently due to stigma and a lack of know-how about the psychological impacts of climate, and it is thus important for a larger section of practitioners who can treat such issues to come out into the public domain. Children and youth are the most vulnerable to the psychological impacts of the climate crisis.
They are more emotionally moved by the thought of a future that is going to be confused with environmental uncertainty. With the issue of climate now much ventilated in schools, media, and public debate, youths are increasingly bombarded with dire predictions about the future of the planet. This exposure can make people increasingly anxious, so some young people may be weighed down by the burden assigned to their generation to solve the problem.
While the impacts of the climate crisis on the mental health of people are absolutely undeniable, however, there are ways to help alleviate and mitigate these impacts. Psychological resilience-building forms part of adaptation to the changing climate. This cultivates a sense of empowerment and agency among individuals and communities, allowing people to realise that, even though they do not have control over international events, they can make a difference at local levels.
For some, this will mean, perhaps, participation in activism for climate, which becomes an important source of meaning and solidarity with others who also share similar fears. Of course, for others, it may mean looking for ways to lower their carbon footprint or supporting sustainable initiatives. Mental health services should also respond to the emergent realities of the climate crisis.
This might include incorporating climate literacy in mental health care, enabling such patients to appreciate how the environment contributes to their anxiety or depression. Mental health professionals would be ready to provide help for people affected by anxiety or climate-related trauma and to work within communities that are especially vulnerable to climate impacts. To put it briefly, the relationship between climate and mental health is complicated and complex but can no longer be ignored.
As the world struggles to find ways of living with the physical challenges presented by the climate crisis, it is of utmost importance to acknowledge the psychological burden that the climate crisis imposes on individuals and society. Addressing the effects of the climate crisis on mental health is not a question merely of personal welfare but an imperative aspect of building resilient communities that can face the uncertainties of tomorrow with strength and hope. This article is authored by Dr Rahul Chandhok, head psychiatrist, head consultant, mental health and behavioural science, Artemis Hospitals.
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