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Study shows climate change will exacerbate brain diseases
Last reviewed: 02.07.2025
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Climate change and its impact on weather patterns and adverse weather events is likely to negatively impact the health of people with brain diseases, according to a team of researchers led by University College London (UCL).
In a paper published in The Lancet Neurology, the team highlights the urgent need to understand the impact of climate change on people with neurological conditions to maintain their health and prevent inequalities from worsening.
After reviewing 332 papers published worldwide between 1968 and 2023, researchers led by Professor Sanjay Sisodia (UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology) concluded that the scale of the potential impact of climate change on neurological diseases would be significant.
They looked at 19 different nervous system diseases selected from the 2016 Global Burden of Disease study, including stroke, migraine, Alzheimer's disease, meningitis, epilepsy and multiple sclerosis.
The team also analyzed the impact of climate change on several serious but common psychiatric disorders, including anxiety, depression and schizophrenia.
Professor Sisodia, who is also director of genomics at the Epileptic Society and founder of Epilepsy Climate Change, said: "There is clear evidence of climate influence on some brain diseases, particularly stroke and infections of the nervous system. Climate changes that have been shown to influence brain diseases have included extreme temperatures (both cold and hot) and large daily temperature variations, particularly when these variations are seasonally unusual.
"Nighttime temperatures may be particularly important, as higher temperatures at night can disrupt sleep. Poor sleep is known to worsen a number of brain diseases."
Researchers found that the number of hospitalizations, disability or deaths due to stroke increases with higher ambient temperatures or during heat waves.
Additionally, the team says people with dementia are vulnerable to harm from extreme temperatures (such as heatstroke or hypothermia) and weather events (such as floods or wildfires), as cognitive impairment may limit their ability to adapt to environmental changes.
The researchers write: “Reduced risk awareness is coupled with a reduced ability to seek help or mitigate potential harm, such as drinking more water in hot weather or adjusting clothing. This vulnerability is exacerbated by frailty, multiple medical conditions and psychotropic medications. Accordingly, greater temperature fluctuations, hotter days and heat waves lead to increased hospitalizations and mortality associated with dementia.”
In addition, morbidity, hospitalization, and mortality risk for many mental disorders are associated with elevated environmental temperatures, daily temperature variations, or extreme hot and cold temperatures.
The researchers note that as the severity of severe weather events increases and global temperatures rise, populations are being exposed to worsening environmental factors that may not have been severe enough to affect brain disease in some of the earlier studies reviewed in the analysis.
As a result, they believe it is important to ensure that research is relevant and takes into account not only the current state of climate change, but also the future.
Professor Sisodia said: “This work is taking place against a backdrop of alarmingly worsening climate conditions and needs to remain flexible and dynamic to provide information that is useful to both individuals and organisations. Furthermore, there is limited research assessing the health impacts of brain disease under future climate scenarios, making forward planning difficult.”
He added: “The concept of climate anxiety is an additional, potentially significant factor: many brain diseases are associated with a higher risk of psychiatric disorders, including anxiety, and such multiple diseases may further complicate the impact of climate change and the adaptations needed to stay healthy. But there are actions we can and should take now.”