They can’t stand up for themselves, but their world is in danger
The population most vulnerable to climate change is the one with the least ability to stand up for itself: young children.
The climate change era is already here: A mid-June heat wave put more than 125 million Americans under extreme heat alerts, while the driest conditions in over a millennium led to raging wildfires in the Southwest and unprecedented flooding hit Montana.
Global warming poses immense threats to early childhood development — so much so that last summer UNICEF declared the climate crisis a “child’s rights crisis.”
Yet little attention has been paid within the U.S. to this intersection of climate change and childhood. That’s why the think tank Capita and the Aspen Institute are teaming up to launch the first-ever national Early Years Climate Action Task Force.
Climate change is already having enduring impacts on children’s health, development and flourishing. Extreme weather events, longer and more intensive heat waves and climate-related displacement will increasingly be major sources of toxic stress, which can alter the development of a child’s brain architecture in ways that are likely to “impair memory, executive function, and decision-making in later life,” according to the American Psychological Association, or APA.