The Mental Toll of Climate Change
https://eos.org/features/the-mental-toll-of-climate-change
By Katherine Kornei, Eos/AGU.
Excerpt: ...Megan Irving, a mental health therapist in Oregon ...and mental health professionals like her are seeing more clients suffering from a ...pervasive, form of stress: unease brought on by the effects of our changing climate. A growing body of research links the impacts of climate change to adverse mental health outcomes, such as depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and substance abuse. But individuals and communities can take steps to bolster their emotional resilience to climate-related stressors, researchers have suggested. ...mental health impacts in three broad categories ...The first category is brought on by acute events such as devastating storms, wildfires, and floods. Sudden-onset events can cause trauma, which often manifests as PTSD and has been linked to anxiety, major depressive disorder, and substance abuse... Events that evolve more slowly—and are almost chronic in nature—are responsible for the second category of impacts. Gradual shifts ...linked to climate change include prolonged droughts, desertification, and persistent heat waves. Changes in temperature and weather patterns can trigger a sense of uncertainty, .... The third broad category of climate change–induced mental health impacts is often characterized as lingering and unshakable concern, worry, or anger. Those feelings—sometimes referred to collectively as climate anxiety—are brought on by an awareness that the environment is, perhaps indelibly, changing. And a person doesn’t need to have experienced trauma personally to be affected....