Blitz Bureau
NEW DELHI: THE United Nations has released a report on health impacts of land degradation and drought 2025. The document identified the connection human health has with land degradation, desertification, and drought.
It highlighted the major diseases that can result from such ecological disasters, like cholera, malaria, cardiovascular ailments, respiratory conditions, and malnutrition. The impact may even cast effect on mental health disorders like anxiety and depression due to displacement and resource scarcity. Droughts may cause morbidity and mortality due to the prevailing heatwave conditions and even may destroy the healthcare system, according to the brief.
Common skin and eye diseases like trachoma, scabies and conjunctivitis are found to be widespread during droughts due to water scarcity. Land degradation may lead to hypertension, heart attacks, stroke, and heighten the risks of cancer and mental health disorders.
The policy brief presented a similar pattern of spatial distribution of Aridity Index (1991-2020) and burden of malnutrition in children under five in low- and medium-income countries (2016-2018). India, along with major countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, showed a major impact on health due to droughts and desertification. The reasons behind this connection are wellknown. Malnutrition and mental ailments may be directly caused by crop loss and low agricultural yield during droughts and subsequent displacement of communities.
Further, as the quantity and quality of water deteriorates during droughts, waterborne diseases raise their ugly heads. Sand or dust storms and wildfires during extreme dry conditions often lead to respiratory diseases. Outbreaks of zoonotic diseases like Ebola and Covid-19 may occur due to land use changes and biodiversity losses. Poor soil health can engender diseases like anthrax or soil-transmitted ailments. Increase in vector borne diseases are observed due to change in habitat of disease-carrying organisms like mosquito.
The UN report mentioned that around $198 billion is the projected health cost by 2050 due to the mental stress and anxiety related to droughts.
India has envisioned a Farmers’ Distress Index (FDI), according to Lok Sabha answers in March 2025. FDI, a user-friendly planning tool, can provide three months advance alert to the stakeholders. The tool can address the cause of farmers’ distress, while also developing measures to tackle the distress.
