London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine

Researchers at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) have been awarded £6.2 million funding from Wellcome for a third phase of the Pathfinder Initiative, the field’s leading research programme on the health benefits of climate action.  

The grant will enable the Pathfinder Initiative team to expand on previous research and make robust and timely evidence on climate and health available and easy to use for decision-making at local, national and international levels.  

‘Pathfinder 3: achieving a healthy net zero 2030’ will include the development of innovative AI-powered tools to speed up the synthesis and generation of evidence, and support the scale-up of effective approaches for climate and health. By using AI the researchers will be able to gather and analyse evidence at a pace and scale that meets the urgency of the climate and health crisis.  

Rosemary Green, Professor of Environment Food and Health at LSHTM and co-lead of the Pathfinder Initiative, said: “The climate crisis is already having devastating impacts on people’s health and lives worldwide. Over the past six years, the Pathfinder Initiative has provided evidence on the solutions that can tackle climate change and bring benefits to health at the same time. We’re looking forward to taking this research to the next level using innovative AI-assisted tools and new methods to bring together and generate evidence on what works, where and for how much in climate and health action.” 

Pathfinder 3 will develop a real-time picture of the latest research, building on the living evidence map produced in the previous phase, which brings together existing climate and health evidence using AI to gather data automatically at scale. This will be used to inform assessments of the environmental, health and economic impacts of interventions and to feed evidence directly into policy processes.  

The researchers will also develop an AI-assisted tool to provide cities with context-specific analysis to support climate and health decision-making, particularly in low- and middle-income settings. The decision-support tool will expand on previous Pathfinder Initiative research on city-level action, and practical lessons learnt from implementation. A central resource hub, hosted on the Pathfinder Initiative Climate and Health Evidence Bank, will bring together guidance, methods, tools and case studies to inform evidence-based action and evaluation. 

Dr Hugh Sharma Waddington, Associate Professor at LSHTM and co-lead of the Pathfinder Initiative, said: “The funding will enable us to develop and refine cutting-edge tools for evidence synthesis, while advancing methods and guidance for evaluating the impacts of climate and health actions. The research will examine the health, environmental and economic co-benefits of climate actions to provide policymakers with a clearer understanding of the costs, benefits and trade-offs of different approaches, helping them to make informed decisions about where to invest and how to maximise impact.” 

The work will draw on and advance previous research, including the Lancet Pathfinder Commission report, which found that climate mitigation actions across sectors including energy, transport, food, agriculture, buildings and industry can bring major benefits to health through cleaner air, increased physical activity, and healthier, more sustainable diets.  

As the new phase of research begins, leaders, scientists, civil society and private sector representatives will come together next week for COP31 in Antalya, Türkiye. Pathfinder Initiative experts will be at the conference sharing evidence to put health at the centre of climate policy and action. 

Andy Haines, Professor of Environmental Change and Public Health at LSHTM who co-led the first two phases of the Pathfinder Initiative and is leading the advisory board in the third phase, said: “At COP31, discussion must move beyond commitments towards implementation. Health is a powerful driver of climate action and a key measure of success. Our research has shown that reducing greenhouse gas emissions and accelerating the transition away from fossil fuels across all sectors could save millions of lives each year. The next phase will provide decision-makers with practical tools and approaches to drive and measure progress.” 

The Pathfinder Initiative involves a wide range of global partners and collaborators, including the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), ICLEI, C40 Cities, and the Wellcome Climate and Health Hubs in Africa in the new phase.  

Read more about the Pathfinder Initiative