Pakistan contributes just over 1% of global greenhouse gas emissions and yet is the fifth-most vulnerable country to climate disasters in the world.
In 2022, record heatwaves and heavy monsoon rains led to massive floods that affected 33 million people and displaced 8 million. Officially, 1,739 lives were lost during the flooding, though the true toll is likely much higher. Similar extreme rainfall and heat returned in 2024, again putting lives at risk.
This report is a collaboration between Indus Health & Hospital Network (IHHN) and Amnesty International to understand the health impacts of flooding and heatwaves. It combines IHHN’s analysis of deaths at three hospitals with 210 interviews by Amnesty International, including with affected families, healthcare workers, NGO staff, and government officials.
The report examines how inadequate disaster responses make it difficult for people to access healthcare, leading to preventable deaths. It highlights the particular risks older people and children face, and that many deaths likely linked to these events are not officially recorded as such, leading to a significant undercount in official death tolls.
Pakistan must increase health sector spending to protect the right to life and health, ensuring more effective responses through better data collection that includes all groups, especially older people and children.
But ultimately, Pakistan cannot do this alone. Other countries that have historically emitted far more greenhouse gases bear responsibility for the harm they have caused. These states must understand that failing to phase out the extraction, production and use of fossil fuels – the primary driver of global warming – threatens the rights to life and health not just of their own populations, but of children and older people all around the world.
Read “Uncounted: Invisible Deaths of Older People and Children During Climate Disasters in Pakistan.”