more than 1.4 million Australian children and young people in an average year
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Deloitte Access Economics modelled the toll for UNICEF Australia.
More than 1.4 million children and young people, one in six children, experience a climate disaster in an average year.
The cost reaches $3.1 billion in an average year and up to $6.2 billion in a high-disaster year.[1]
Babies and younger children sweat less than older children and adults, so they cool down less effectively.
Young children may also fail to recognise early signs of overheating or express discomfort.[2]
Heat-related illness ranges from dehydration to life-threatening heat stroke.
A New South Wales study tracked children aged zero to 18 from 2000 to 2020.
On heatwave days, hospital admissions for the illness were 104 per cent more likely.[2]
Bushfire smoke carries PM2.5, fine particles under 2.5 micrometres wide that reach deep into the lungs.
The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare tracked the 2019-20 fires and found rising inhaler sales in affected regions. It also found a clear link between poor air quality and respiratory emergency visits in New South Wales.[9]
Australia recorded its fourth-warmest year in 2025 and its hottest ocean temperatures on record. The 2025-26 summer then brought flash floods followed by bushfires that engulfed more than 500 properties. That damage ranked the worst since the 2019-20 Black Summer.[6]
Orygen and Mission Australia analysed 16,230 responses to the 2025 Youth Survey from people aged 14 to 19. Some 76 per cent reported climate-related effects on their emotions, daily functioning or safety. Climate and environment ranked among their top three national concerns, alongside cost of living and mental health.[3]
Researchers sorted respondents into four groups: low, emotional, functional and safety impact. Emotional impact (30 per cent) means worry and sadness without major disruption to daily life. Functional impact (25 per cent) adds grief and disruption, and safety impact (23 per cent) centres on severe-weather fear.[3]
Deloitte’s analysis found disaster-exposed young people up to 4.5 per cent more likely to show symptoms of psychological distress. Those children experienced more stress, panic, anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder during the disaster and the next year.[1]
Adolescence is when mental ill-health most often emerges, so Orygen urges early intervention before distress escalates. The Royal Australian College of General Practitioners urges doctors to watch for climate-related health issues in children.[3][10]
Deloitte estimates disaster-exposed young people are 4.2 per cent less likely to complete high school. Disasters destroy homes and schools and disrupt attendance. Parental financial stress can lead children to skip class or drop out.[1]
Consultancy Mandala Partners and insurer Zurich Australia modelled the climate exposure of 9,829 primary and secondary school sites. Two-thirds of those schools sit in the three highest-risk categories, with New South Wales and Queensland most exposed. By 2060, up to 84 per cent could face significant climate risk at 2°C of warming.[4]
Extreme heat also drags on learning. The report projects 34 heatwave days a year by 2060 and up to 7 per cent lower academic attainment. That drag could trim lifetime earnings by roughly $75,000.[4]
The Australian Education Union has launched a national inquiry into public school infrastructure, chaired by Sharan Burrow. The ACT Government expects to spend $15 million across 2025-26 and 2026-27 on a heating and cooling fund. Burroughs describes piecemeal upgrades that lack a system-wide response.[8]
Deloitte found disaster exposure leaves young people 2.9 per cent more likely to face temporary displacement or short-term homelessness. That equals 170 additional children and young people becoming homeless in an average year.[1]
The Housing, Homelessness and Disasters National Symposium reported 5.6 million homes at bushfire risk and 953,000 vulnerable to flooding. Floods, bushfires and cyclones displace 23,000 Australians every year. Floods on the New South Wales Mid North Coast left 1,153 homes uninhabitable.[5]
Australia faces a shortfall of more than 640,000 affordable homes. Homelessness services turn away 30 per cent of people seeking help. Chief executive Kate Colvin says people already sleeping rough or couch surfing slip further to the margins.[5]
The symposium urged a National Disaster Housing and Homelessness Framework to link climate adaptation with housing policy. Its recommendations include pre-disaster planning for emergency accommodation and rapidly deployable modular housing. Colvin says both homelessness and disasters result from policy choices about where to build and whom to protect.[5]
Deloitte found remote, lower-income and Indigenous children face disasters more often than other children. Orygen found climate impacts intensify existing inequalities, including poverty, housing instability, disability and marginalisation.[1][3]
The federal government released its first National Climate Risk Assessment, a national inventory of climate threats, on 15 September 2025. It identified 63 nationally significant risks and flagged seven specific to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities. They span Country (ancestral lands and waters), cultural knowledge and food security, with rising seas threatening Torres Strait homes.[6][7]
Andrew Watkins, a lead author of the assessment at Monash University, tracked the federal response over 12 months. Federal Disaster Ready Fund adaptation spending has fallen from $200 million a year to roughly $140 million in 2026-27. The Federal Government has approved at least six coal and gas project extensions since and has yet to commit to future assessments.[6]
UNICEF Australia asks governments to weigh children’s needs in climate risk assessments and invest in better data. It also wants a national approach to supporting children after disasters, with recovery funding that reflects their needs.[1]
The evidence points in one direction. Heat, smoke, disaster trauma, lost schooling and unstable housing already shape childhood for more than 1.4 million young Australians. Each pressure compounds existing disadvantage in remote, low-income and Indigenous communities.
Governments hold the data and the budgets needed to respond. Federal adaptation funding has shrunk, coal and gas approvals continue, and Canberra has yet to promise another national risk assessment.
UNICEF Australia, Orygen and Homelessness Australia each call for coordinated responses. Child-sensitive risk assessments, cooler classrooms, disaster housing frameworks and early mental health care offer practical steps.
Accountability for every year of delay rests with the governments that set the policy.
1. Three ways climate change is changing childhood in Australia. Deloitte Access Economics analysis for UNICEF Australia quantifies disaster effects on children’s schooling, mental health and housing.
2. Children can be more vulnerable in the heat. Here’s how to protect them this summer. Heat researchers summarise a New South Wales study of heatwave days and child hospital admissions.
3. Three in four young people say climate change is affecting their wellbeing, safety or daily life. Orygen reports findings from the 2025 Mission Australia Youth Survey on climate-related emotional, functional and safety impacts.
4. Students to suffer at schools in climate firing line. AAP reports Mandala Partners and Zurich Australia modelling of climate risk across 9,829 Australian school sites.
5. Climate and housing crises converging to threaten Australian families, New Report Warns. Homelessness Australia summarises a national symposium on housing, homelessness and disasters.
6. It’s been one year since Australia assessed its national climate risk. But have we listened?. Monash University analysis by assessment author Andrew Watkins tracks federal action since the National Climate Risk Assessment.
7. Climate report warns First Nations communities face greatest risks. SBS NITV reports the First Nations risks identified in the National Climate Risk Assessment.
8. Students home because of heat: why a federal focus on infrastructure is needed. The Canberra Times reports an ACT kindergarten heat case and the Australian Education Union’s national school infrastructure inquiry.
9. Australian bushfires 2019-20: exploring the short-term health impacts. The Australian Government’s health agency links the 2019-20 bushfires to inhaler sales and respiratory emergency visits.
10. Nurturing tomorrow: Mental health effect on children and youth due to climate change. This peer-reviewed general practice paper outlines how climate change affects the mental health of children and young people.
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