Ecological impacts of climate change will transform public health priorities for zoonotic and vector-borne disease

Climate change impacts on zoonotic/vector-borne diseases pose significant threats to humanity1 but these links are, in general, poorly understood2. Here, we project present and future geographical risk patterns for 141 infectious agents to understand likely climate change impacts, by integrating ecological models of infection hazard (climate-driven host/vector distributions and dispersal3,4) with exposure (human populations) and vulnerability (poverty prevalence). Projections until 2050, under a medium climate change (Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 4.5), show a 9.6% mean increase in endemic area size for zoonotic/vector-borne diseases globally (n=101), with expansions common across continents and priority pathogen groups. Range shifts of host and vector animal species appear to drive higher disease risk for many areas near the poles by 2050 and beyond. Projections using lower climate change scenarios (RCP 2.6 & 4.5) indicated similar or slightly worse future population exposure trends than higher scenarios (RCP 6.0 & 8.5), possibly due to host and vector species being unable to track faster climatic changes. Socioeconomic development trajectories, Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs), mediate future risk through a combination of climate and demographic change, which will disrupt current, regional patterns of disease burden. Overall, our study suggests that climate change will likely exacerbate global animal-borne disease risk, emphasising the need to consider climate change as a health threat ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Funding Statement This research was supported by an MRC UKRI/Rutherford Fellowship (MR/R02491X/1, MR/R02491X/2), Sir Henry Dale Research Fellowship (funded by the Wellcome Trust and the Royal Society) (220179/Z/20/Z, 220179/A/20/Z) (DWR), and The Trinity Challenge Sentinel Forecasting Project (KEJ, RG). ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Yes I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Yes I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Yes I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines, such as any relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material, if applicable. Yes All data produced in the present study are available upon reasonable request to the authors