Climate Change and Reproductive Health: Adopting a Comprehensive Approach to Reduce the Impact.

Abstract

In the current century, climate change has been regarded as one of the most serious public health threats, which has drastic health, environmental, and social aftereffects. The purpose of the current article is to identify the direct and indirect impacts of climate change on reproductive health and to propose specific public health recommendations to reduce these identified impacts. Climate change has been linked with multiple reproductive concerns, such as pregnancy complications, sexually transmitted infections, and infertility, which can cumulatively pose to be a major concern. Climate change significantly contributes to the deterioration of the air quality, while exposure to fine particulate matter and heavy metals can result in infertility in both men and women by altering hormone levels, impairment of sperm, and the quality of eggs. There arises the need to adopt a proactive and interdisciplinary approach to minimize the impact of climate change on reproductive health. In conclusion, a wide range of direct and indirect consequences of climate change have been reported on reproductive health. This calls for the need to develop climate-adaptive healthcare systems and policies to reduce the existing risks, including promoting easy access to family planning.