Anticipatory action for climate-sensitive infectious diseases: Latin America Regional Assessment

Climate hazards can play a pivotal role in the transmission of disease. Extreme temperatures, floods, droughts, storms and other climatic hazards can directly and indirectly influence the spread of infectious diseases. For example, rising temperatures can expand the geographical range of disease vectors like mosquitoes, enabling the transmission of diseases like malaria and dengue in new areas. Flooding can contaminate water sources, while droughts can reduce access to clean water and sanitation, increasing the risk of waterborne disease. Moreover, extreme weather events often disrupt healthcare systems, infrastructure and supply chains, making accessing healthcare and essential medicines for infectious diseases challenging for affected populations. The Red Cross Red Crescent working group on anticipatory action and health seeks to advance the work on anticipating and preventing adverse health outcomes within the Red Cross Red Crescent Movement (“the Movement”). Many anticipatory action initiatives have focused on extreme climate and weather events. But there are still increasing opportunities to look beyond these and act ahead of other hazards, including disease outbreaks and epidemics. This report complements the working paper on anticipatory action for epidemics, which is intended to contribute to a common understanding of the concept of anticipatory action for epidemics across the Movement. This assessment is valuable guidance for National Societies in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) who wish to engage in anticipatory action for epidemics. It aims to provide evidence for deciding which infectious-disease risks should be prioritized for early warning and early action initiatives, and recommendations on next steps. Malaria and dengue are infectious diseases for which developing anticipatory action approaches is feasible. They can be pursued in the following priority countries (alphabetically): Barbados, Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, and Peru. Cholera is also a priority disease for Haiti and Mexico. This prioritization does not preclude the development of anticipatory action for other diseases in other countries; however, based on the analysis, these are the most viable options for the next few years.