Advances on health risk perceptions of climate change and adaptation strategies among health professionals

Global climate change has widespread and serious impacts on human health and is expected to be worse in the future. The World Health Organization has called for health professionals to play an important role in addressing climate change and protecting public health, especially in climate-sensitive disease surveillance, vulnerable population identification and care, health co-benefit promotion, risk communication, and environmental advocacy. We systematically reviewed international research advances of health care professionals’ perceptions and adaptation strategies on climate change-related health risks. We found that most health professionals basically recognized the health threats of climate change and adopted a few early warning strategies in coping with heat waves and climate-sensitive infectious diseases. However, they still faced significant challenges and obstacles, and needed more health risk assessment information, risk management expertise, and adequate health workforce and financial support. Future research should strengthen the assessment on the relationship between climate change-related health risk perceptions and actual adaptation actions, and the evaluation on priority adaptation strategies, and the effectiveness and cost-benefit analysis of interventions, aiming to help government decision-making departments and health professionals respond to climate change positively.