Climate emergency leadership day and adaptation (WHC/2025/005)

Status:

Action.

Category:

Workforce.

Title:

Climate emergency spread and scale leadership day and adaptation.

Date of expiry / review:

7 March 2025.

Action by:

• Chief executives, health boards/trusts.
• Medical directors, health boards/trusts.
• Research and development directors and leads, health boards/trusts.
• Nurse executive directors, health boards/trusts.
• Directors of therapies and health sciences, health boards/trusts.
• Directors of planning, health boards/trusts.
• Directors of primary care, health boards/trust.
• Directors of public health, health boards/trusts.
• Directors of workforce and organisational development, health boards/trusts.
• Directors of finance, health boards and trusts.

Required by:

31 December 2025.

Sender:

Carly Morgan,
Climate Change and Environmental Public Health (EPH),
Health, Social Care and Early Years
CarlyMarie.morgan@gov.wales

Welsh Government contacts:

Health and Social Care Climate Emergency National Programme:

Rachel Gardiner, Climate Change and EPH
Health, Social Care and Early Years
Rachel.Gardiner@gov.wales

Carly Morgan,
Climate Change and EPH,
Health, Social and Early Years
CarlyMarie.morgan@gov.wales

HSC Climate Emergency Mailbox: HSC.ClimateChangeAndEPH@gov.wales

Enclosures:

Two links.
Spread and Scale Academy
Health and Social Care Adaptation Toolkit

Dear colleagues

On 21 February we hosted the inaugural Climate Emergency Spread and Scale Leadership Day. This event brought senior leaders together from across NHS Wales and showcased innovative initiatives proven to help meet our climate change commitments, alongside also improving patient outcomes, reducing costs and improving staff engagement. We saw inspirational projects from across NHS Wales driven by passion and commitment by colleagues from all healthcare settings. We are really pleased the day resulted in tangible commitments that will help embed climate considerations across all that we do and also spread and scale projects to help transform the way we work. Thank you to all those able to attend. We will be sharing the outputs via the climate emergency health and social care programme newsletter shortly.

Much of the leadership day focused on activity to help decarbonise NHS Wales, however we cannot lose sight of the need to also ensure the NHS builds its climate resilience. The recent winter storms are a stark reminder of how our communities and NHS services are directly affected, with the science showing that these events will continue to become more pronounced and frequent over the coming years and decades. There is also a strong economic case for identifying climate risks and improving resilience as soon as possible. The costs of responding to, for example, the damage caused by climate change are likely to be many times higher than the cost of preventative measures.

In line with "A healthier Wales"' refreshed actions, NHS organisations must embed action on the climate emergency in decision-making and plans. As part of this work, organisations should build on their existing decarbonisation action plans to develop broader ‘climate response plans’ that cover both emission reduction and adaptation action.

We recognise the additional support health and social care organisations may require to progress work on adaptation planning. The 'Climate adaptation strategy for Wales 2024' sets out the overarching strategy for adaptation planning, including for the health and social care sector (see section 5.7 and page 57). To support implementation of the strategy, a health and social care toolkit has been published to help organisations identify the climate risks and opportunities most relevant to them and which should then inform work on plan development.

Our expectation is for all organisations to have completed scoping, current and future risk assessment (sections 1 to 3 outlined in the Toolkit) and to have plans in place prioritising what short and longer term actions will be taken (sections 4 and 5) by 31 December 2025. The health and social care climate emergency national programme will continue to collaborate with you and provide guidance on this work as required.

Finally, the deadline for NHS organisations to submit entries against Wales Sustainability Awards categories has been extended to 21 March 2025. This will enable staff who are both passionate about the climate agenda, but also impacted by winter pressures more time to enter, and provide the opportunity to further raise the profile of sustainability throughout the NHS. Apply here!

I would like to thank you for your continued support on this important agenda.

Kind Regards,
Sioned Rees
Director of Public Health Protection
Welsh Government