Heat waves and wildfire smoke are having significant and largely overlooked impacts on the foundations of learning and development. As we grapple with increasingly common heatwaves and air quality alerts, kids are struggling to learn in schools lacking air conditioning and sports practices are being cancelled because of smoke, a largely invisible threat sits in the shadows: The direct impacts of climate hazards on the developing brain.

From the womb through infancy and childhood, the climate conditions we grow up in shape our cognitive potential and our lifelong vulnerability to mental illness. Extreme heat exposure during pregnancy, for example, is associated with a 26 per cent greater risk of pre-term birth, which has significant impacts on healthy development. 

But the impacts don’t end at birth. 

During infancy and childhood, excessive heat exposure affects cognitive development and the ability to learn. We see this in school environments across the country, where classrooms become so hot that students struggle to stay alert, concentrate and remember what was taught. For those without air conditioning at home, the exposure continues long after the........

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