Citizens Medical
'[By 2050] climate-induced impacts will account for a further $1.1 trillion in extra costs to healthcare systems, creating a significant additional burden on already strained infrastructures and medical and human resources... Importantly, climate change will exacerbate global health inequities. The most vulnerable populations, including women, youth, elderly, lower-income groups and hard-to-reach communities, will be the most affected by climate-related consequences.'
- Quantifying the Impact of Climate Change on Human Health, World Economic Forum Report, January, 2024
Why We Want to Do It
The big question is who or what is going to address this massive gap in global healthcare access.
Today, the United Nations remains the driving force in global public health, but it is in the midst of a deep existential and systemic crisis. UN funding is declining as their relationships with their primary donors, national governments, grow strained over allocation and management. The UN is also unreformed, lacking in transparency and flailing in its own bureaucracy.
The non-governmental humanitarian sector is faring better, but they too are increasingly struggling with growing demand, spurred on by inequality, global warming and conflict.
The result is that access to health services in the world today is increasingly dependent on personal means and even then limited in scope as the cost of care rises dramatically. This leaves billions of people behind, especially the poor and vulnerable.
But as distressing as all that is, the foundation of Citizens Medical is much more driven by the outlook for the future.
Most demographic, environmental and economic data for the next twenty five years on the planet present far greater challenges than we have today.
According to the UN, the global population is set to rise from 8.2 billion people now to 9.7 billion in 2050 [1]. Economic inequality in many countries is growing [2], and global climate change could displace tens of millions of people, fueling internal and external migration in the coming decades [3]. Ongoing global shortages in primary care physicians and nurses will also continue to impact patient outcomes negatively [4].
The math is not hard to do.
At Citizens Medical, we are big fans of hope. But we are bigger fans of pragmatism. As the world deals with these challenges, we want to ensure that no one is excluded from basic health needs, information or access to life-saving medical care.
Global health is in desperate need of answers.
1. https://population.un.org/wpp/Graphs/DemographicProfiles/Line/900
2. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/rising-inequality-a-major-issue-of-our-time/
3. https://www.weforum.org/stories/2024/01/climate-change-health-impact-mortality/
4. https://www.who.int/health-topics/health-workforce#tab=tab_1
