ExpectedOutcome:
Projects results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:
- regions, local authorities and communities have been involved in development and testing of a whole range of transformative solutions that will help to mitigate the effect of climate change on health and human wellbeing, including making the public health sector more climate resilient and better prepared to mitigate the climate change related health challenges.
- climate resilience solutions that protect human health have been developed, tested and are made largely available
Scope:
This topic relates to the Mission’s objectives to mobilise at least 150 regions in testing the solutions most locally needed to build climate resilience and to deliver at least 75 deep demonstrations of systemic transformations to climate resilience.
The proposals should test and demonstrate solutions that address both the two aspects below, including in the scope at least some of the individual points related to improve prevention and policy-making and at least some points related to improve preparedness of the health system.
1. Improve prevention and policy-making, by:
- Improved insights into short- and long-term health effects of climate-related stressors, including planetary health considerations (interactions between global climate change, ecosystem, animal and human health as described in the One Health concept). Taking into consideration differences between infectious and non-communicable diseases, and the particularities of each. With regard to the infectious diseases, emphasis should be given on the surveillance and prevention of zoonotic diseases. These improved insights should made available and be integrated by the regional and local authorities in their planning. The European Climate and Health Observatory can contribute to these efforts and, reversely, learnings from the projects supported under this topic would contribute to the Observatory knowledge basis.
- Strengthening comprehensive and user friendly epidemiological surveillance and modelling and forecasting tools, including socio-economic trajectories and adaptation scenarios of exposure and vulnerability to climate determinants. These tools should be suitable for assessing and predicting impact of moderate, extreme and record-breaking events and disasters associated with climate change, including impacts on mental health. Environmental stressors should also be considered when relevant for the prevention of major non-communicable such as cardiovascular and respiratory diseases e.g. combination of heat waves and air pollution or increase in pollens. Surveillance, modelling and forecasting tools should be piloted in the partner regions and communities. Reflecting the One Health concept, the link between animal health impacts due to climate change and subsequent human health impacts should also be considered, when relevant.
- Development of better forecast, early-warning and early response systems and decision-making models for health impacts of climate change which are able to monitor both the impact and the effectiveness of solutions.
- Development and health impact assessment of adaptation measures and monitoring of effectiveness of solutions to improve resilience of countries, regions and cities, including effective nature-based solutions (NBS).
2. Improve preparedness of health systems by:
- Development of innovative solutions (technological solutions, NBS, etc) to reduce impact of climate change on human health and wellbeing. Heat and cold waves and floods should be among the stressors considered, but proposals should not limit their work to only these two stressors and might consider the association with environmental conditions such as the association of heat waves and air quality or exposure to pollens. Solutions should be designed with a win-win objective so to not have a negative effect on climate mitigation efforts, after sufficient consideration of positive and negative interactions.
- Preparing training curricula on health and climate change for medical and other healthcare professionals across Europe. The proposed curricula should be trailed in the partner regions, local authorities and communities, training pilot group of professionals.
- Development of innovative, fit-for-purpose, end-user driven early warning and response systems or improving existing ones, including a demonstration of their predictive/response capacity, to ensure a rapid response from health services and civil protection authorities and testing/pilot such systems in the partner regions/local authorities/communities.
- Providing feedback and sharing best practice from pilots to the new Health Emergency Preparedness and Response Authority. Such tests should be accompanied by public awareness campaigns in relation to climate forecasts and health early warning systems, identifying the warning communication chain, role, tasks and responsibilities of science advisors and decision-makers.
Under the Mission approach, collaborations to develop and test effective solutions between regions/local authorities/ communities facing similar challenges are highly encouraged. To this purpose, the proposals must include at least 4 different regions/local authorities/ communities, which should collaborate in addressing the common challenge identified and conducting demonstration activities of the most suitable solutions. These (at least) 4 demonstrations must be located in at least 3 different EU Member States and/or Horizon Europe associated countries, for which the proposed solution is relevant. Involvement in the proposal of regions eligible for Cohesion funds[1] to conduct at least one of the proposed demonstrations shall be regarded as a positive element.
The proposals should clearly identify the biogeographical area, for which the proposed solution is relevant and should explore possible reapplication to other regions, starting from those located in the same biogeographical areas. To support a large impact, the proposed solutions should be widely re-applicable. To this purpose, identification and inclusion of at least three “replicating” regions/local authorities/communities, interested in reapplying the lessons learnt (totally, partially or with the required adjustments) in their territories is strongly encouraged; this could take the form of inclusion in the consortium of one or more partners providing support for the technical exchanges and the knowledge uptake in the “replicating” regions.
In addition to the local/regional authorities owning the climate challenge, the consortium may include other type of partners, such as private or public research organisations, enterprises and NGOs, to ensure that all needed capabilities are available to develop and implement real life actions.
Proposals should build (when relevant) upon previous developed solutions or existing knowledge and adaptation solutions, designed and developed from previous research projects, including from beyond EU, addressing climate change adaptation and funded by European and National programmes, in particular the European Union Framework programmes for Research and Innovation (such as Horizon 2020 and Horizon Europe under their different pillars and clusters), as well as the LIFE programme. Moreover, proposals should look into opportunities to scale up the solutions demonstrated and to foster their broad deployment across in Europe through the LIFE programme, and its integrated projects in particular, and through the ERDF programmes.
Proposals should include a mechanism and the resources to establish operational links with the Climate-ADAPT platform (run by the European Environment Agency (EEA) together with DG CLIMA) that will act as a central element for the monitoring, support and visualisation of the Mission progress in European Regions. To this purpose, projects will feed their results to the Climate-ADAPT and EEA assessments.
Projects funded under this topic are strongly encouraged to participate in the Mission Community of Practice that will be established amongst the Mission Charter signatories by the Mission Implementation Platform in the course of 2023 and in the networking and joint activities with other projects funded under other topics in the Mission Climate Adaptation as well as in other relevant Missions, as appropriate. These networking and joint activities could, for example, involve the participation in joint workshops, the exchange of knowledge, the development and adoption of best practices, or joint communication activities. To this extent, proposals should provide for dedicated activities and earmark appropriate resources. Beyond the Mission, the projects funded under this topic are also encouraged to exchange and identify cooperation opportunities with other projects funded under Horizon Europe, in particular those funded under Cluster 1 and its destination 2 “Living and working in a health-promoting environment”
The European Commission intends to establish a network and coordination activities amongst all the projects funded for the implementation of the Climate adaptation Mission, under the Horizon 2020 European Green Deal call and under Horizon Europe, and that will be coordinated by the soon to be established Mission Implementation Platform. The projects under this topic will be requested to contribute to this effort. Applicants should acknowledge this request and already account for these obligations in their proposal, making adequate provisions in terms of resources and budget to engage and collaborate with the Mission governance.
To ensure a balanced portfolio covering the different climate risks as identified in the Mission Implementation Plan and to maximize the footprint across all the different biogeographical areas[2], the best ranked proposals for each biogeographical area will be selected.
Specific Topic Conditions:
Activities are expected to achieve TRL 6 to 7 by the end of the project – see General Annex B
[1]Territories eligible for Cohesion funds are defined under the Cohesion policy: https://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/sources/graph/poster2021/eu27.pdf?
[2]As defined by the Habitat Directive Council Directive 92/43/EEC of 21 May 1992 and the related Nature2000 legislation and as indicated by the EEA: Biogeographical regions — European Environment Agency (europa.eu): Alpine, Atlantic, Black Sea, Boreal, Continental, Macaronesian, Mediterranean, Pannonian, Steppic
