What Malaria Officers Need vs. What Climate Scientists Provide
Consider a malaria control officer in eastern Africa facing practical questions: Should we stockpile more mosquito nets this year? Will we need to expand spray zones? Should we hire additional field workers? These decisions require investment and infrastructure that can’t materialize overnight.
“People are often asked questions around climate change, but if you are down in the weeds as a malaria, dengue or Zika control person, you are really largely dealing in the timeframe of climate variability,” says Dr. Madeleine Thomson of Wellcome. “What is happening now? What happened last year? What might happen next year in this particular locality?”
Climate scientists can provide sophisticated projections for 2075 or 2100 under different emissions scenarios. They can tell you which regions will see the most dramatic changes over coming decades. But ask them about the next five to fifteen years—the exact timeframe when health decision-makers need actionable information—and the picture becomes murky.
The challenge is compounded by climate variability—natural fluctuations that significantly impact regional weather patterns in the short term. These variations interact with longer-term climate trends, making near-term predictions extraordinarily difficult.
In Pakistan, increasingly intense monsoons linked to climate change have triggered devastating floods. When floodwaters recede, stagnant pools become perfect mosquito breeding grounds. Malaria cases surged from 500,000 in 2021 to 1.3 million by 2024. But predicting which specific districts will flood most severely in any given year remains challenging.
This timeframe mismatch has real consequences. A perfectly accurate 50-year projection is useless to someone planning next year’s disease surveillance program. Resources get misallocated. Interventions arrive too late.
Thomson and Wellcome are funding 24 research teams across 12 countries to develop digital tools that better integrate climate data with health information—tools designed specifically for the actionable timeframes health workers actually need.
