Anticipatory Intelligence: Policy Pathways and Service Models for Strengthening Public Health Surveillance of Climate-sensitive Diseases

Anthropogenic climate change is fundamentally reshaping the global transmission landscape of infectious diseases, expanding the spatiotemporal range of spread for three categories of pathogens: vector-borne, water-borne and zoonotic. Traditional public health surveillance, which centers on post hoc responses to confirmed cases, is no longer suited to this new context. There is an urgent need to transition to a new, proactive system adapted to climate conditions and the core barrier to this shift is the fragmented governance structure that keeps the health and meteorological sectors disconnected. Currently, the global integrated field of climate and public health has two core shortcomings: financing mechanisms generally focus on emergency outbreak responses while undervaluing routine preventive preparedness, and the workforce lacks the interdisciplinary training required to support the integration of climate and health efforts. This scoping review adopts a multi-method analytical framework, covers three specific research areas and is structured around two core questions. It posits that strengthening public health surveillance is fundamentally a governance and service delivery issue rather than a purely technical matter. Finally, it develops a three-pillar climate-smart public health framework whose design elements precisely address the aforementioned shortcomings.