Climate change is reshaping everyday life in ways that go far beyond the environment, directly affecting people’s health, safety, and dignity. Across Kenya and other parts of the Global South, climate shocks such as droughts, floods, heatwaves, and food insecurity are intensifying existing inequalities. For women, girls, young people, and marginalized communities, these shocks increasingly threaten sexual and reproductive health and rights, making the climate crisis not only an environmental issue but also a deeply human and justice-centered one.
As climate-related disasters become more frequent and severe, health systems are often among the first to be disrupted. Flooded roads, damaged facilities, and strained resources make it harder for people to access essential services such as contraception, maternal health care, HIV services, and safe abortion care. For pregnant women, these disruptions can mean delayed or unsafe deliveries and a higher risk of complications and maternal mortality. Health facilities may lack clean water, electricity, or medical supplies, while health workers themselves may be displaced, weakening already fragile referral systems.
Food insecurity driven by climate change also has serious sexual and reproductive health consequences. Drought and unpredictable rainfall affect crop production and livelihoods, increasing hunger and malnutrition. Pregnant and breastfeeding women, adolescent girls, and infants are particularly vulnerable, facing higher risks of anemia, low birth weight, and poor health outcomes. Economic strain can also push young people into harmful coping mechanisms, including transactional sex or early marriage, undermining bodily autonomy and increasing exposure to violence and unintended pregnancies.
Climate change does not affect everyone equally. It deepens existing gender and power inequalities. Women and girls often carry the responsibility of securing water, food, and fuel, tasks that become more dangerous and time-consuming as natural resources become scarce. Longer journeys in search of these resources increase exposure to sexual and gender-based violence. Climate-induced displacement further heightens these risks, as overcrowded shelters and informal settlements often lack privacy, lighting, and protection, while essential SRHR services such as menstrual health supplies, post-rape care, and psychosocial support are frequently overlooked in emergency responses.
Young people, especially adolescent girls, face heightened risks during periods of climate stress. School dropout, early pregnancy, and forced marriage often increase when families lose livelihoods or are displaced. These outcomes are not inevitable; they reflect policy and system failures that ignore the intersection between climate action, gender equality, and sexual and reproductive health and rights. When SRHR is excluded from climate planning and disaster preparedness, the most vulnerable are left to bear the greatest burden.
Effective climate responses must therefore be rights-based and inclusive. Climate action that focuses only on emissions, infrastructure, or technology without addressing human rights risks reinforcing harm. Integrating SRHR into climate strategies means building resilient health systems that can continue delivering essential services during crises, ensuring that disaster preparedness and humanitarian responses include contraception, maternal health care, HIV services, and comprehensive responses to sexual and gender-based violence. It also means rejecting harmful narratives that frame population control as a climate solution, as such approaches undermine reproductive autonomy and are rooted in coercion rather than justice.
Communities and young people are central to building solutions that work. Across Kenya, youth-led and community-based initiatives are already linking climate justice with bodily autonomy, gender equality, and social justice. These actors bring local knowledge, lived experience, and innovative approaches that are often missing from national and global policy spaces. Supporting and resourcing their leadership is essential for creating climate responses that are both effective and equitable.
Addressing the climate crisis without addressing sexual and reproductive health and rights is incomplete and unjust. Climate justice is about protecting people as much as it is about protecting the planet. Centering SRHR in climate action is critical to ensuring dignity, autonomy, and resilience for women, girls, young people, and communities facing the frontlines of climate change, now and in the future.