Mother’s Day in the United States is typically associated with spring, and new life.
But because of the climate crisis, Mother’s Day also heralds hotter summers with more and longer heat waves, worsening North Atlantic hurricane season, and terrifying wildfires in the months ahead. An increasingly important public health event – Heat Awareness Day – follows on May 31.
Climate impacts are expected to be more extreme again this year and threaten to worsen the maternal health crisis in the US. That crisis is marked by unjust inequities in maternal mortality, illness, and premature birth; with worse rates for Black, Indigenous, and other women of color than white women, and for women living in poverty compared to the better-off.