Urban Climate Disasters and the Last Mile of U.S. Nutrition

Editors' Note

Last week, world leaders descended on New York City for the UN General Assembly, which also coincided with Climate Week NYC. This year's proceedings, the largest annual climate event of its kind, followed the hottest summer on record—and came mere days before Hurricane Helene wreaked havoc through climate-boosted flooding.

Against that backdrop, New York City Health Commissioner Ashwin Vasan uses real-world examples in his article to outline the sustainable paths policymakers can travel to make global urban areas safer, healthier places to live as climate disasters become more common.

Pivoting to global health politics, Diplomat Hampus Homer explains how growing multipolarity and renewed regional autonomy are transforming global health efforts traditionally dominated by the West.

Next, Hilda Ebinim and Oluwadamilare Olatunji from the Sydani Group, and Laura Hoemeke from the University of North Carolina's Gillings School of Global Public Health, translate the results of a new survey from Nigeria that explains the economic factors driving an exodus of nurses and midwives.

Traveling to South Africa, journalist Thabo Molelekwa uncovers the factors behind the country's high incidence of medical negligence—noting that the number of claims increased by an average of 23% each year from 2014 to 2020. Medicolegal claim payouts remain high, totaling 4.12 billion rand ($235 million) over the last three years.

To wrap up the edition, researchers from the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation introduce a new survey that measures how much community-based food programs and U.S. farmers markets improve people's diets through access to fruits and vegetables.

Until next week! —Nsikan Akpan, Managing Editor, and Caroline Kantis, Associate Editor