International climate change panels often point out that women are more vulnerable to climate change than men. Hotter temperatures and more volatile weather inflame existing gender-based vulnerabilities, like domestic violence, inadequate access to health care, and financial insecurity. But there is another, largely invisible layer of climate impacts that falls along gendered lines: Research shows that climate change takes a profound physical toll on bodies that can bear children — from menstruation to conception to birth.
There are various pathways by which climate change worsens health problems before, during, and after pregnancy. A pregnant person’s immune system stands down during those crucial nine months so as not to reject the growing fetus, leaving the gestating parent more susceptible to climate-driven infectious diseases like malaria….