Integrating Sectors, Scales and Disciplines in the Climate-Health Nexus: A Framework for Systemic Risks and Multi-Stressors Vulnerability Research

Abstract

Scientific research on multiple stressors, compound hazards, and systemic risks presents missed opportunities for integration. We present a transdisciplinary framework that seeks to connect evidence on health and climate crises in the Anthropocene. To this end, we review research on multiple stressors, compound hazards, and systemic risks along the axis of breadth and depth, representing the thematic and sectoral variety and multiple integrated scales of analysis, respectively. We then outline a research gap as the need for a translator from trade-offs into synergies. We identify three essential requirements for this translator and define a research framework integrating top-down (macro) and bottom-up (micro) evidence by mixing methods from social and climate sciences using an agent-based model. Finally, we present an implementation of this framework for the COVID-19 crisis in two Brazilian cities (São Paulo and Porto Alegre) and provide an outlook for future research on multiple stressors.