Assessment of health risks due to climate change in Germany

As part of the AdaptNet project, which aims to adapt and network general practitioner and specialist medical care to the health impacts of climate change, interactive maps are being produced for Germany that estimate current and future health risks. For heat, flooding, air quality, allergens, vectors and forest fires, it will be possible to obtain corresponding hazard levels at the level of districts and independent cities (corresponding to the NUTS3 regions in Germany). Estimating the health risks associated with climate change helps to avoid over- and under-adaptation of ambulant care to the consequences of climate change.

The methodology developed is based on the assessment of the most important factors for each hazard. The high spatial resolution requires a correspondingly high-resolution data base to be able to represent regional characteristics in the risk assessment. For the assessment of the current situation, data from recent years was used to include the already advanced climate change of the early 21st century. The future estimates refer to data around the year 2050.

The methodology was evaluated using two test regions (urban and rural). Very complex and data-intensive risk assessments were carried out for the two test regions and compared with a simpler approach, which was then applied to the whole of Germany.

When developing risk assessments relevant to emergency and disaster risk management in the health sector, WHO recommends that three factors be considered: hazard, exposure and vulnerability. We ensured that hazard and exposure were covered by factors in the risk assessment itself. Vulnerable groups were deliberately not included in the risk assessment, because they are individually targeted in an adaptation toolbox developed in the AdaptNet project.