A/HRC/10/61 page 12 4. The right to health 31. The right to the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health (the right to health) is most comprehensively addressed in article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and referred to in five other core international human rights treaties.44 This right implies the enjoyment of, and equal access to, appropriate health care and, more broadly, to goods, services and conditions which enable a person to live a healthy life. Underlying determinants of health include adequate food and nutrition, housing, safe drinking water and adequate sanitation, and a healthy environment.45 Other key elements are the availability, accessibility (both physically and economically), and quality of health and health-care facilities, goods and services.46 32. Climate change is projected to affect the health status of millions of people, including through increases in malnutrition, increased diseases and injury due to extreme weather events, and an increased burden of diarrhoeal, cardiorespiratory and infectious diseases.47 Global warming may also affect the spread of malaria and other vector borne diseases in some parts of the world.48 Overall, the negative health effects will disproportionately be felt in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and the Middle East. Poor health and malnutrition increases vulnerability and reduces the capacity of individuals and groups to adapt to climate change. 33. Climate change constitutes a severe additional stress to health systems worldwide, prompting the Special Rapporteur on the right to health to warn that a failure of the international community to confront the health threats posed by global warming will endanger the lives of millions of people.49 Most at risk are those individuals and communities with a low adaptive capacity. Conversely, addressing poor health is one central aspect of reducing vulnerability to the effects of climate change. 44 CEDAW, arts. 12 and 14, para. 2 (b); ICERD, art. 5 (e) (iv); CRC, art. 24; CRPD, arts. 16, para. 4, 22, para. 2, and 25; International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families (ICRMW), arts. 43, para. 1 (e), 45, para. 1 (c), and 70. See also ICESCR arts. 7 (b) and 10. 45 CESCR general comment No. 12, para. 8. 46 See CESCR general comment No. 12, CEDAW general recommendation No. 24 (1999) on art. 12 of the Convention (women and health); CRC general comment No. 4 (2003) on Adolescent health and development in the context of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. 47 IPCC AR4 Synthesis, p. 48. 48 Uncertainty remains about the potential impact of climate change on malaria at local and global scales because of a lack of data and the interplay of other contributing non-climatic factors such as socio-economic development, immunity and drug resistance (see IPCC WGII Report, p. 404). 49 A/62/214, para. 102.