Climate Anxiety: If You Plan to Not Have Kids, You're Not Alone

The definition of 'normal' is changing – what's normal now, like heatwaves, wasn’t normal for earlier generations.

More and more young people are opting to be childfree – and climate anxiety is a significant factor behind this.

(Photo: The Quint)

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When she was 18, Anushree Joshi decided that she didn't want to have kids – multiple reasons led her to make this decision, some political and some more personal.

While people around her thought that she’ll grow out of this idea, it only solidified in the coming years. Now a 24-year-old sustainability researcher at a consulting firm, Joshi knows that climate change is one of the biggest factors that she doesn’t want to have a child, ever, even though she loves children.

It was her job that made her understanding of the climate crisis more robust. In fact, ongoing global events like Israel’s war in Gaza or the Ukraine-Russia war and the lack of reporting on the climate consequences of these also helped Joshi realise that the climate crisis is one that is not taken seriously anywhere.

In January this year, a research study titled A Multitemporal Snapshot of Greenhouse Gas Emissions from the Israel-Gaza Conflict, suggested that in the first two months of Israel’s war on Gaza, over 2.8 lakh tonnes of carbon dioxide was emitted by Israel’s “aerial bombardment and ground invasion.”

The study further stated that this number is more than the annual carbon footprint of “20 of the world’s most climate-vulnerable nations.”

In her case, Joshi's partner has been supportive and acknowledges that climate anxiety, for him too, acts as a solid deterrent to have children. But they are not alone.

A study conducted by University College London last November said that in 12 out of the 13 cases they analysed, people expressed desire to not have children at all or have fewer children due to fears about “climate breakdown.”

Diseases, Wars, Displacements: Who Knows What Awaits Us?

While speaking to The Quint, there was one sentiment common between people who are opting to be childfree.

As Anantika Mehra, a 30-year-old entrepreneur from Mumbai, puts it, “Apna thikana nahi hai, kisi aur ko kaise sambhalenge? (We are not sure about our future plans; how will we handle someone else?)”

A major concern brought up was that the definition of 'normal' is changing quicker than ever – what is normal for us (like heatwaves) wasn’t normal for the generation before us and won’t be for the one that comes after too.

Krishna Kakani, a 26-year-old journalist from Indore, wonders if in 30 years, the climate would be “stable enough for children to have a safe future.”

For him, the idea of putting another generation through deadly heatwaves, water shortages, unpredictable rains, flood like situations, and possibly food insecurity, is not one that he wants to pursue.

Mehra couldn’t agree more. She tells The Quint that when it’s highly probable that a few years down the line, there would be wars for water and other major resources, she can’t conceive of a stable future for her own self, let alone having to take care of a child.

And when islands like Kiribati (a country in Oceania) have already been drowning, says Aakanksha M, a 25-year-old Hyderabad resident, “it seems like we’ve reached a point of no return.”

She tells The Quint, “Can you imagine the healthcare cost burden on the next generation? There’ll be diseases all around, newer viruses when the permafrost thaws.”

“It’ll not be possible to be a normal, happy, and functioning adult in a world grappling with the climate crisis. I can’t bring up a child knowing this is the kind of world they’d have to grow up in where they would possibly have to become climate refugees.”

Anushree Joshi

‘Existential Anxiety’: How the Climate Crisis Is Triggering People

For Mehra, what triggered this anxiety was the COVID-19 pandemic, when she first realised “how unprepared we are to deal with any emergency situation.”

That was when she started reading about climate change, about encroachment of forests, about diseases, and pandemics.

While people around her dismissed this as her having read too many dystopian books, Dr Kedar Tilwe, Consultant Psychiatrist, Fortis Hospital Mulund & Hiranandani Hospital, Vashi, explains that this is called “existential anxiety.”

“You have a certain set of beliefs and ideas for the future, but then a crisis situation makes you question things since you can’t foresee what might happen. This worsens if you already have anxiety or depressive symptoms and can lead to helplessness and hopelessness. You can’t envision your future and may take decisions in survival mode. This increased in a lot of people during COVID – when for the first time, we had a global situation of increasing anxiety.”

Dr Kedar Tilwe

Aakanksha has also been facing something on similar lines. News about floods, heat waves, and extreme weather events has boggled her down too deep into anxiety.

Dr Tilwe suggests that while this anxiety is valid because the threat of climate change is very real, it can help you to voice your concerns and have open conversations with people you rely on.

Taking a break from news and doom scrolling can also help alleviate the anxiety a little bit. But in case the increasing anxiety forces you go into survival mode, it’s best to reach out to a mental health professional. 

‘Not Enough Is Being to Combat the Climate Crisis, There’s No Reassurance for Us’

Where this anxiety also stems from is the intergovernmental response to the climate crisis (or the lack thereof). 

For one, Joshi says that the global response to climate change has not been as strict as it should have been. She sighs that had it been an economic crisis, leaders would have been on their feet stepping up, but “maybe this is not important enough for them, there’s a clear lack of interest to tackle this.”

Kakani tells The Quint,

“The annual climate change conferences appear to be smoke and mirrors at best, doing little to address the eco-anxiety. It shouldn’t have to take 29 iterations for the so-called climate leaders to work out legally binding commitments and see them through. Yet here we are.”

There are a lot of worries these young people share for themselves and for the next generation:

• Global bodies are saying we can’t let the world get warmer than 1.5 degrees Celsius, but even that world is uninhabitable and unimaginable – have they modelled any scenarios on how to deal with it?

• The UN Emissions Gap Report 2023 found that the world is on track for 2.5-2.9 degrees Celsius warming above pre-industrial levels by 2100. Does that take our cumulative emissions into account?

• If we magically achieve our net zero targets today, how will it stop the world from still getting warmer, considering we’ve locked in so much heat already?

• Till when can we let corporations invest just enough that they go on freely polluting and emitting harmful substances?

“Given the resistance to phasing out fossil fuels, how am I supposed to imagine a healthier future for myself, let alone for those after me? What do the 2060 and 2070 timelines mean for us and our kids? Can we count on the government to understand our unique vulnerabilities to the crises, if not act on it?”

Krishna Kakani