Climate change threatens mental health.
- Extreme heat is associated with increased self-harm and violence as well as more general feelings of negativity. It also leads to feelings of isolation when people feel trapped inside their relatively cooler homes.
- Wildfire or extreme weather stokes anxiety leading up to an event–and afterward–that can lead to PTSD or depression for survivors who have seen cherished places or lives lost.
- Farmers, fisher people, and others whose livelihoods are tied to the environment experience chronic stress, worry, and depression over things they can’t control, like extreme weather, habitat loss, and drought.
- Water scarcity increases stress for people in charge of seeking and transporting household water. Water scarcity also makes it hard for people to stay clean, potentially leading to isolation, loneliness, and depression.
- Air pollution can keep kids out of school, leading to social isolation and, over time, a sense of hopelessness about the future.
- People are experiencing the compounding effects of multiple disasters so people can no longer recover psychologically from one before another occurs.
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