Mental Health and Climate Change
Challenge: Climate change poses significant threats to public health in general and to mental health in particular.
Position: The American Association of Community Psychiatrists (AACP) recognizes that climate change poses significant threats to public health in general and to mental health in particular. Persons with mental illnesses and behavioral health challenges are disproportionately impacted by the consequences of climate change. Psychiatrists are uniquely positioned to help reduce barriers to addressing climate change, such as denial, hopelessness and behavioral passivity, and to enhance efforts to communicate the public health and mental health risks of climate change through mechanisms that result in sustained behavioral change. As advocates for mental health and persons with mental illness, psychiatrists have an important role to play in efforts to control the adverse effects of climate change.
AACP recognizes and commits to efforts to prevent and mitigate climate change impacts through:
Education of individuals, community leaders, policy makers and healthcare professionals about the public health and mental health impacts of climate change
Collaboration with public mental health departments to enhance infrastructure and develop response plans to address the reactive mental health effects of climate related weather events as well as the anticipatory distress experienced by individuals and communities concerned about the impact of climate change
Encouraging open and ongoing communication and collaboration within the healthcare community regarding ways that individuals and communities can reduce the adverse mental health effects of climate change, including the progressive development of strategies to allow individuals and communities to build adaptive resilience for climate change-associated stresses and traumas within individuals, organizations, communities, and society
Engaging in policy and program development by calling upon U.S. policy makers, to reduce or eliminate denial of the reality and immediacy of climate change and to make the necessary behavioral changes needed to mitigate the underlying causes as well as reduce the progression of climate change
Recognizing the disproportionate burden of climate change on vulnerable populations, including persons with mental illness, and advocate for policies that respond and protect them
Please reference the attached position paper for more information about implementing this position.