Sea-level rise is often spoken about in centimetres, forecasts and future scenarios. But what if we understood it as a health emergency that is already reshaping lives, harming bodies and minds, and displacing entire communities?

This week, as a landmark Lancet Commission launches, Christiana Figueres and Tom Rivett-Carnac argue that sea-level rise must be understood not just as a climate threat, but as a health crisis currently unfolding. And, as co-chair of the Lancet Commission on Sea-Level Rise, Health and Justice, Christiana brings us inside the thinking behind this urgent new effort.

Christiana speaks to commissioners ‘Ofa Kaisamy, Professor Anne Poelina and Dr Sandro Demaio, who paint a vivid picture of what happens before and as the water arrives. This is a story of food insecurity, damaged clinics and hospitals, disease, displacement, trauma, and the loss of ancestral knowledge and cultural continuity. But it also points to an opportunity to finally see sea-level rise in fully human terms, with those on the frontlines shaping the response.

What changes when we stop treating rising seas as a distant environmental problem and start recognising them as a present health emergency? And what might become possible if the people most affected are no longer treated as victims, but as leaders?

Learn More:

🌊 Read The Lancet Commission launch paper on sea-level rise, health and justice.

🩺 Read Christiana’s opinion piece on health and sea-level rise in the Guardian

🏝️ Explore WHO Western Pacific’s work on climate change and health in the Pacific

📈 Go deeper with the IPCC on sea-level rise and low-lying coasts and islands.

🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipe

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Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks

Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan

Exec Producer: Ellie Clifford

This is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

As headlines warn of a possible ‘super El Niño’ later this year, we ask: how do we respond to a warning before it becomes a catastrophe?

The last major El Niño brought record heat, crop failures, flooding and deepening food insecurity across large parts of the world. This time, the question is not only what may be coming, but whether we are any better prepared to act on the warning?

Tom Rivett-Carnac and Paul Dickinson look at what the forecasts do and do not tell us about the climate ahead in 2026, and what it means to prepare for a crisis that is still uncertain, but increasingly hard to ignore.

And in a world of shrinking aid budgets and rising climate risk, they’re joined by Andrew Kruczkiewicz from the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre and Columbia Climate School - how do you justify spending on a crisis that hasn’t happened yet?

From anticipatory finance and early warning systems to the politics of aid cuts and the difficulty of communicating risk in real time, they explore what climate preparedness looks like when the stakes are already human and immediate.

Learn More:

🔴 Browse the Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre’s work on linking climate science and action

🩺 Read the WHO explainer on ENSO and health

🌊 Get up to date on NOAA’s latest ENSO Diagnostic discussion for the clearest official snapshot of what forecasters are currently saying about the chances of El Niño emerging in 2026

🛰️ Explore the World Food Programme’s work on anticipatory action and see their Bangladesh case study to see how it’s used in practice

🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipe

Join the conversation:

Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimism

Or get in touch with us via this form.

Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks

Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan

Exec Producer: Ellie Clifford

This is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

We used to be shocked by this. Hundreds of thousands displaced, millions affected, whole communities washed out. But somewhere along the way, extreme weather events have become background noise.

This week, Christiana Figueres, Tom Rivett-Carnac and Paul Dickinson explore what it means to live in a world where extreme rainfall, displacement and repeated flood damage are no longer rare shocks but part of a rapidly changing climate reality. Last year alone, Southern Africa, Pakistan, Brazil, South Sudan, and many other countries were devastated by catastrophic flooding. We reflect on the scale of the global crisis, the lives upended, and the huge economic losses that too often go uninsured.

Then Paul speaks with Louis Ramirez, co-founder of Flooded People UK, about what happens when flooding stops being just a weather event and becomes a political force. They discuss the growing toll of flooding in the UK, from mental health impacts to rising insurance costs and falling property values, and ask what collective action looks like when communities are forced to confront climate damage on their own doorsteps.

As the front lines of climate change move ever deeper into the Global North, will governments finally respond with the urgency this crisis demands? And can the devastation that flows from climate impacts help rally a social movement for change?

Learn More:

About flooding in the UK…

🌧️ Explore Flooded People’s resources on the state of flooding in the UK

🏠 Read about the government-backed Flood Re insurance programme mentioned in this episode

📍 Check the long-term flood risk for your area (England only, with links to other UK nations)

About flooding internationally…

🌍 Read more about worldwide flood risk from the World Bank

🔎 Explore how extreme weather events are being attributed to climate change at World Weather Attribution

🚨 Understand how flooding is displacing people across the globe at the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre

🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipe

Join the conversation:

Instagram @outrageoptimism LinkedIn @outrageoptimism

Or get in touch with us via this form.

Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks

Edited by: Miles Martignoni

Planning: Caitlin Hanrahan

Exec Producer: Ellie Clifford

This is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.