A 2026 analysis in *Science* argues that public debt can leave countries more exposed to the next disaster: when governments prioritize loan repayments over resilience, they may have to borrow heavily after a catastrophe, then have less room to prepare for the next one. A report by Katya Poltorak, with Northeastern University, uses Jamaica’s experience after Hurricane Melissa to explain this cycle. The report was republished by Phys.org.
Melissa, a Category 5 storm in 2025, flooded plantain farms, damaged homes and knocked out power across much of Jamaica. United Nations satellites showed that about 4.8 million metric tons of rubble were hauled away in roughly 480,000 truckloads. Jamaica’s Planning Institute put damage and losses at up to $12.2 billion—56.7% of the country’s 2024 gross domestic product. The *Science* analysis estimated that disaster insurance and catastrophe bonds covered only around 2% of the costs.
The analysis was by Auroop R. Ganguly, a Northeastern civil and environmental engineering professor, Aayushi Mishra, a graduate student at Northeastern’s College of Engineering, and colleagues. They describe a “climate debt doom loop” with three linked pressures: debt payments can take priority over protective infrastructure; insurance payouts may cover only a small share of recovery costs; and governments borrow to make up the difference, leaving them with less capacity to prepare for another disaster.
Jamaica’s budgets illustrate the competing demands. In 2024–25, the country set aside around $3.15 billion for debt payments, roughly six times the $510 million devoted to construction and infrastructure upgrades, according to the report’s account of the analysis. The researchers argue that this pressure can persist even when a country has worked to improve its finances. Jamaica had spent years reducing debt, and its credit rating was upgraded shortly before Melissa struck, but the storm brought new recovery costs and loans.
The researchers propose four changes to help countries invest in resilience. First, debt assessments could account for spending on disaster preparation, so that money for protection does not automatically make a country appear less able to manage its debt. Second, countries could gain access to an expanded but unused International Monetary Fund trust that would free funds for food and water after disasters. Third, loan agreements could pause repayments when a disaster occurs. Fourth, insurance could reflect how exposure varies between communities, rather than relying only on measures such as wind speed or rainfall.
Some changes to debt assessments are already underway, according to the report: the IMF began rolling out models that gave more credit to disaster preparation in 2022, and its updated 2025 guidance reinforced that approach for resilience loans. Tools approved by the IMF and World Bank in September 2026 could potentially give low-income countries more room to invest in storm protection. These steps are described as developments in progress, while the researchers’ other proposals are recommendations.
The report also presents debt cancellation as a possible route to giving climate-hit countries more resources for recovery and protection. Teresa Anderson of ActionAid International argues that money otherwise allocated to repayments could support those needs. Daniel Clarke of the Centre for Disaster Protection points to a political hurdle: governments may get more visible credit for responding to disasters than for preparing for ones that have not happened.
Resilience, the report notes, can also extend beyond engineered structures. Theresa Rodriguez-Moodie of the Jamaica Environment Trust argues that forests, wetlands, coral reefs and coastal ecosystems help protect Jamaica from extreme weather. The central concern is that climate risks and debt pressures can reinforce each other, while financial frameworks may not account well for disasters that are frequent or intensifying. The report cites Anderson saying that many of the countries most vulnerable to climate change also face heavy debt repayments; it does not detail the underlying calculation.
The account summarizes the *Science* analysis but does not describe its methods or uncertainty estimates, so the reported figures and proposed reforms should be read in that context.