Climate Impacts Awards: Unlocking urgent climate action by making the health effects of climate change visible

The aim of this scheme is to make the impacts of climate change on physical and mental health visible to drive urgent climate policy action at scale. We will fund transdisciplinary teams to deliver short-term, high-impact projects that maximise policy outcomes by combining evidence generation, policy analysis, engaged research approaches and communication strategies.

Scheme at a glance

Career stage:

Mid-career researcher, Established researcher

Where your administering organisation is based:

Anywhere in the world (apart from mainland China)

Level of funding:

Up to £2.5 million

Duration of funding:

Up to 3 years

Next deadline

Full application deadline: 3 April 2024

View all key dates

About this scheme

In 2023, Wellcome launched the Climate Impacts Awards and funded 11 innovative global projects.

In 2024, we will fund projects that generate context-specific evidence using community knowledge and experiences to deliver actionable policy outcomes that can be scaled to multiple settings. We will prioritise funding for research that involves and serves the needs of communities most impacted by the health effects of climate change, and advances stories and narratives that tend to be absent in the media or underrepresented in public discourse (Perga et al, 2023). This will include generating and/or synthesising relevant data and insights (preferably across multiple sites or countries) on significant health issues arising from climate impacts.

We are looking for proposals with a clear theory of change and strong understanding of policy levers. Policy outcomes should be achievable within the award period, innovative in their design and should support meaningful and sustainable change. Proposals should describe the intended policy outcomes and how new insights and effective communication will influence these outcomes.

Teams must have prior demonstrable success in work that combines science, policy and society (Serrao-Neumann, et al 2021). We use the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) definition of transdisciplinary research. Transdiscipilary research combines knowledge from different scientific disciplines, citizens, public and private sector stakeholders to address complex societal challenges. By engaging key stakeholders from the outset and embedding different expertise in the research design, we expect that teams will use evidence and impactful narratives on the effects of climate change on health to drive urgent policy change that supports collaborative solutions for climate change adaptation and mitigation. 

This scheme aims to make the impacts of climate change on health visible. There are many reasons the impacts of climate change could be invisible.

These include but are not limited to:

distance: decision makers not being based where the impacts are happening ideology: political polarisation results in missing voices, disinformation or lack of information unseen: some of the climate impacts of environmental drivers of health outcomes (for example, certain chemicals, pollutants or microscopic organisms) may not be visible and therefore may be ignored linkage: the links between climate change and health effects not being explicitly made or understood low priority: climate change's effects on health are not given much focus due to competing priorities, unconvincing analyses and communications challenges.

 

If you are disabled or have a long-term health condition, we can support you with the application process. 

Key dates

You must submit your application by 17:00 BST on the deadline day. We don’t accept late applications.

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Questions on eligibility, what we offer and applications

If you have a question about eligibility, what we offer or about completing the application form using Wellcome Funding, send our funding information advisers a message. 

Remit questions 

If you have a question about your proposal, contact us at: climateimpacts@wellcome.org  

We do not answer questions on the scope or competitiveness of proposals. 

Useful documents

Sample Application FormPDF 276 KB