Pathways to reducing climate change-induced mortality: The role of health expenditure, environmental regulations, climate technology, and disaster management

This study offers new insights into mitigating climate change-induced mortality in emerging economies. It emphasizes the critical roles of health expenditure, environmental regulations, climate technology, and disaster management, which have rarely been explored in prior investigations. On this basis, annual data (1995-2023) from eight emerging countries were analyzed using cutting-edge panel estimators that are robust to cross-sectional nuances. Based on the estimates of the quantile via moments (QvM) technique, the study unraveled the heterogeneous implications of the selected variables on climate change-induced mortality. The heterogeneous effects underscore varying policy initiatives of each country. Among the variables, environmental control and disaster management substantially aligned with SDG 3.9 by significantly minimizing climate change-induced mortality across all quantiles. Hence, policymakers need to strengthen existing environmental regulations and disaster management to ensure they reduce climate change-related mortality as optimally as possible. Conversely, health expenditure and climate technology invalidated the theoretical proposition by failing to reduce climate change mortality over the distributions. Therefore, it is pertinent to realign health expenditure and climate technology to ensure they respond to SDG 3.9 by reducing climate change-induced mortality. More policy insights are articulated to ensure minimal climate change-related mortality in line with SDG 3.9. • Death associated with climate change is explored. • The study explored the perspectives of eight emerging economies. • The Quantile-via-Moments panel estimator is employed for analysis. • Health expenditure and climate technology failed to mitigate climate change mortalities. • Environmental regulations and disaster management reduced climate change mortalities.