Climate and health capacity building for climate-resilient health systems in Europe, 2025

Background

Climate change poses growing risks to population health and health system functioning. Building climate-resilient and low-carbon health systems requires a workforce equipped with appropriate competencies. However, structured climate and health training remains unevenly implemented.

Objectives

We evaluated the 2025 ASPHER–GCCHE European Climate Resilient Health Systems Course, a 10-week, open-access, virtual training programme delivered in English from January to April 2025. The course aimed to strengthen competencies through expert-led lectures and applied case studies. 70% in attendance and assessments granted a certificate. Pre- and post-course surveys assessed self-reported confidence across six domains using a 10-point Likert scale.

Results

A total of 4,432 individuals from 164 countries registered; 3,018 attended at least one session, 1,456 attended at least seven sessions, and 1,029 participants from 119 countries met attendance and assessment criteria. Significant improvements were observed across all domains (p < 0.001), with mean confidence increasing from 45% to 59%. Confidence in communicating about decarbonisation and resilience increased from 5.8 to 8.5, participation in vulnerability and adaptation assessments from 5.5 to 8.1, applying vulnerability and adaptation frameworks from 4.9 to 7.8, and developing climate-resilient organisational plans from 5.0 to 7.9. Gains were consistent across EU-27, EEA-32 and WHO European Region subgroups. Nearly half reported no previous formal climate and health education.

Conclusions

This pan-European course strengthened self-reported climate-resilient health system competencies at scale. Its open-access, competency-based and certified format offers a replicable model for workforce development and professional training. Integrating similar courses to formal curricula and continuing professional development may support climate-resilient and low-carbon health system policies across Europe and beyond.

Key messages

• Open-access, competency-based online training can strengthen climate-resilient health system competencies among health professionals at scale.

• Consistent confidence gains across European subregions suggest online training can help reduce disparities in climate and health literacy.