Pope Leo is in France for several days, in the first formal papal visit to the nation in nearly 20 years. One of his stops is to meet with child survivors of sexual abuse by Catholic priests.
Philippe Chemineau said he was abused by a priest as a child, and argues that the secrecy surrounding confession helped enable abuse.
As the pope meets with a small group of survivors during his visit, the debate over how the Catholic Church should confront past abuses and protect children remains far from settled.
High-risk periods include inpatient stays and post-discharge transitions, warranting repeated assessments emphasizing affective symptoms, hopelessness, prior attempts, substance misuse, recent illness course, and treatment adherence.
Suicide Risk Formulation improves clinical actionability by integrating risk status, dynamic risk state, protective resources, and foreseeable triggers to drive safety planning, monitoring intensity, and continuity-of-care tactics.
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Learn a multidimensional approach to suicide prevention in schizophrenia—screening, insight paradox, cannabis, cognition, trauma, and ethical AI monitoring.
Ta/AdobeStock
Suicide risk in individuals with schizophrenia is a critical clinical challenge, with an estimated lifetime risk of approximately 5%. Despite extensive research, accurately predicting suicide in this population remains difficult due to the complex interplay of multiple risk factors and the heterogeneity of clinical presentations.1In this article, key findings are summarized to provide a guideline for a structured, multidimensional approach to suicide risk assessment and intervention.
1. Initial Screening for Suicide Risk Factors in Individuals With Schizophrenia
It is important to conduct a brief clinical interview to identify key static and dynamic risk factors for suicide in patients with schizophrenia, as identified in systematic reviews. Important aspects to document and prioritize include the following:
Frequent or recent psychiatric hospitalizations or illness onset (< 1 year)
Demographic risks: younger age, male sex, unemployment
Poor adherence to treatment2-5
Recommendations for prevention emphasize close monitoring of high-risk patients, especially in inpatient settings and during transitions such as hospital discharge. Regular suicide risk assessments should be conducted for newly admitted patients, with attention to family history, substance abuse, depressive symptoms, hopelessness, and treatment adherence.4
2. Suicide Risk Formulation
Traditional suicide risk assessment often yields false positives and may be insufficient for guiding clinical management. The field is shifting toward a more comprehensive suicide risk formulation (SRF) approach, which integrates multiple dimensions to inform treatment strategies.6 The SRF process involves the following 4 key areas:
Risk status: Demographic and clinical characteristics placing the patient in a higher risk group (eg, young males, recent illness onset).
Recommendation: If a high-risk status is present, increase monitoring frequency and consider inpatient care if imminent risk is present.
Risk state: Current risk level assessed through ongoing evaluations to detect changes or periods of elevated risk.
Recommendation: Initiate safety planning, crisis intervention, medication review, and psychosocial support when required.
Available resources: Identification and strengthening of patient support systems and crisis services.
Recommendation: Engage family and social supports, and connect the patient to crisis services and community resources.
Foreseeable events:Anticipation of triggers or stressors (eg, hospital discharge) that may exacerbate risk, allowing proactive planning.6
Recommendation: Develop proactive transition plans and schedule follow-up assessments to ensure continuity of care.
This multidimensional framework enhances understanding of individual risk profiles beyond diagnosis alone, accommodating the dynamic nature of suicidality in schizophrenia.
3. Evaluation of Anosognosia as a Suicide Risk
Anosognosia, or poor insight into illness, is a prevalent symptom in schizophrenia linked to neurocognitive deficits and brain abnormalities, particularly in the frontal and prefrontal cortex.7 It is associated with medication nonadherence and functional impairments. The relationship between insight and suicidality is complex. Better illness insight can paradoxically increase suicide risk, particularly when accompanied by depression, hopelessness, or demoralization.8,9Patients with greater awareness may experience self-stigma and diminished quality of life, heightening suicidal ideation. Insight fluctuates over time, and changes in insight level may signal increased suicide risk.10 Suicide risk related to insight appears mediated by mood and self-perception factors rather than insight alone. Psychoeducational and cognitive behavioral interventions aimed at improving insight must be carefully managed to avoid exacerbating suicidal ideation.11
Recommendations to assess and manage anosognosia as a suicide risk include the following:
Assess illness insight through a clinical interview and, if available, validated scales.
Recognize the “insight paradox”: Better insight may elevate suicide risk via increased depression, hopelessness, and self-stigma.
Monitor and manage mood symptoms and internalized stigma alongside insight levels.
Carefully tailor psychoeducational and cognitive behavioral interventions to improve insight while mitigating psychological distress.
Implement close monitoring during high-risk periods such as hospital discharge.
4. Cannabis Use and Suicide Risk
Cannabis use adds complexity to suicide risk assessment in schizophrenia due to its effects on neurobiology and impairments in social cognition.12Chronic cannabis use may increase suicide risk through dysregulation of the endocannabinoid system and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis.13 Dissociative symptoms linked to cannabis may be misinterpreted as psychosis but correlate with worse clinical outcomes and higher suicide risk. The bidirectional relationship between cannabis use and dissociative symptoms may perpetuate psychosis and suicidal behaviors, particularly during the first episode of psychosis.14 Patterns of cannabis use (frequency, potency, age of onset) influence risk, with daily use, high-potency cannabis, and early onset associated with greater suicidality.15
Recommendations for substance use assessment include the following:
Screen for cannabis and other substance use patterns, including frequency, potency, and age of onset.
Evaluate cognitive and dissociative symptoms related to cannabis use that may influence suicide risk.
It is imperative to monitor the heightened risk of suicide associated with cannabis use in individuals experiencing a first episode of psychosis.
Integrate findings into the overall risk profile and treatment planning, including psychoeducation about risks and integration of substance use rehabilitation.
5. Neurocognitive Profiles
Emerging research highlights the role of neurocognitive factors in suicide risk.Impairments in social cognition (eg, emotion recognition, theory of mind) and general cognition (eg, attentional control) are more pronounced in patients who attempt suicide compared with those with suicidal ideation alone.16 Cognitive assessment is frequently overlooked when evaluating the prominent symptom clusters of schizophrenia. Deficits in neurocognition and social cognition result in challenges within social, educational, and occupational domains. When individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia fail to achieve these typical adult goals due to cognitive and social deficits, it may directly or indirectly contribute to an elevated risk of suicide.17
Recommendations for assessment of neurocognitive domains include the following:
Briefly assess neurocognitive domains relevant to suicide risk, including social cognition and attentional control.
It is advisable to employ standardized cognitive assessments, such as the Brief Cognitive AssessmentTool for Schizophrenia or the Screen for Cognitive Impairment in Psychiatry.
Adapt interventions to cognitive limitations and consider neuropsychological support and rehabilitation.
6. Adverse Childhood Experiences
The presence of a history of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) correlates with more severe illness, treatment resistance, and increased suicide risk in schizophrenia spectrum disorders. While researchers must avoid oversimplification or stigmatization when linking ACEs to suicide risk, screening for ACEs should be integrated into suicide risk assessments to inform personalized interventions.18
Recommendations for screening and management of developmental profiles include the following:
Conduct a comprehensive assessment of ACEs alongside other developmental milestones to identify potential developmental vulnerabilities that may influence risk factors and treatment responses.
Integrate trauma-informed care methodologies into the approach.
7. Technological Advances and Risk Algorithms
There is a growing consensus that suicide prevention in schizophrenia requires moving beyond static risk factor identification and toward dynamic, algorithm-based risk prediction models.6,19 Machine learning can analyze complex interactions among multiple risk factors and provide individualized risk predictions. Risk factors incorporated into algorithms may include demographic variables, clinical history, insight levels, substance abuse, social support, cognitive functioning, practical aspects (knowledge of and access to lethal means), personality traits, and acquired aspects (eg, ACEs and views on death).20
Frequent, repeated assessments (potentially via mobile technology) allow real-time tracking of risk fluctuations, especially during the critical first decade post diagnosis. Wearable devices and digital phenotyping offer promise for continuous monitoring but raise ethical concerns regarding privacy, data security, informed consent, and potential algorithmic bias. Ethical frameworks must guide the development and implementation of artificial intelligence–based suicide risk tools to ensure transparency, fairness, and patient safety.21,22
Recommendations include the following:
Conduct repeated suicide risk assessments, especially during critical periods such as postdischarge or early illness phases.
Where feasible and ethically appropriate, consider digital tools or mobile assessments for real-time risk monitoring.
Concluding Thoughts
Suicide risk assessment in schizophrenia demands a multidimensional, dynamic approach that transcends diagnosis alone. It must be comprehensive, integrating clinical, cognitive, social, and environmental factors within an SRF framework. The SRF model offers a structured framework for evaluating risk status, current risk state, resources, and foreseeable stressors. Insight-related interventions require careful balancing to mitigate the “insight paradox” and associated demoralization and depression.
Cannabis use, neurocognitive impairments, and consideration of patients’ developmental histories, including ACEs, enriches understanding of individual vulnerabilities and can enhance personalized care. Future directions emphasize the integration of machine learning algorithms and digital monitoring to capture the complexity and temporal variability of suicide risk, balanced with ethical safeguards to protect patient rights and well-being. This holistic approach aims to improve prediction, prevention, and ultimately reduce suicide rates in this vulnerable population.
Dr Kotzéis an associate professor at Weskoppies Psychiatric Hospital, Gauteng Health and Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pretoria.
Dr Roosis an emeritus professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pretoria.
If you hear the term “longevity” and think only about living longer, you’re missing half the point.
“What we actually want is both more years and more of those years lived in good health,” says Dr. David Barzilai, a longevity physician and the medical editor of Harvard Health Publishing’s Special Health Report Pathways to Longevity. “Almost no one wants additional years of frailty and dependence; they want more years of feeling well, moving freely, thinking clearly, and staying engaged with the people and work they love.”
To that end, recent years have seen an explosion in interest in longevity and healthy aging, largely driven by “science that’s genuinely more exciting than it was a decade ago,” says Dr. Barzilai, also a lecturer at Harvard Medical School.
Lifestyle integral to longevity
While it’s clear that genetics play a role in living longer and staying healthy, lifestyle appears to be just as important. Five lifestyle patterns consistently show up in longevity research: movement, nutrition, sleep, stress management, and social connection.
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Improving Sleep: A guide to a good night’s rest
When you wake up in the morning, are you refreshed and ready to go, or groggy and grumpy? For many people, the second scenario is all too common. Improving Sleep: A guide to a good night’s rest describes the latest in sleep research, including information about the numerous health conditions and medications that can interfere with normal sleep, as well as prescription and over-the-counter medications used to treat sleep disorders. Most importantly, you’ll learn what you can do to get the sleep you need for optimal health, safety, and well-being.
“Good health is surprisingly unglamorous,” Dr. Barzilai says. “What matters most are the basics people already know about but rarely execute consistently over decades. There is no magic to it.”
Here, Dr. Barzilai expands on each of the five pillars of longevity.
Movement
Movement is the closest thing people have to a “master signal,” he says. “It improves nearly every system at once, from insulin sensitivity to brain health to bone density. And cardiorespiratory fitness is one of the strongest predictors of mortality we have ever measured.”
Dr. Barzilai recommends combining various forms of movement to maximize health, including twice-weekly resistance training and 150 minutes of moderate or 75 minutes of vigorous aerobic activity each week. “And everyday movement counts on its own,” he says. “Breaking up long stretches of sitting with two to three minutes of light activity measurably improves glucose and blood-pressure responses.”
Nutrition
Nutrition shapes the metabolic environment our cells live in day to day, governing blood glucose, inflammation, and the raw materials for muscle and repair, Dr. Barzilai says.
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Healthspan vs. Lifespan
We’re living longer than ever—but are we living well?
Harvard Medical School’s Special Health Report, Pathways to Longevity, looks beyond “anti aging” hype to share what science really says about extending your healthspan—the years you stay strong, independent, and mentally sharp.
From nutrition and movement to sleep, stress, social connection, and the latest longevity drugs, this report turns complex research into clear, practical steps you can start now.
“The principles that have held up across decades of research are unglamorous and durable: build meals around whole foods,” he explains. “Get enough protein, which becomes more important, not less, as you age. And avoid the large blood glucose spikes you get from refined carbohydrate eaten on its own, which in practice means anchoring meals with protein, healthy fats, and fiber.”
Sleep
Sleep is fundamental to longevity because that’s when the body takes care of essential maintenance — clearing metabolic waste from the brain, consolidating memory, and resetting the hormones that govern appetite and stress, Dr. Barzilai says.
Experts recommend adults get seven to eight hours each night. Research also shows that consistency matters more than quantity. “That is encouraging,” he says, “because a steady wake time, weekends included, is something most people can actually manage.”
Stress reduction
Stress itself isn’t a problem, since our body’s acute stress response — which sharpens focus and fuels energy levels — can protect us from genuine threats.
“The trouble comes when it never switches off,” Dr. Barzilai says. “Chronic stress holds the body in a low-grade alarm state that, over years, wears on the cardiovascular and immune systems, disrupts sleep and metabolism, and appears to accelerate several of the underlying processes of aging.”
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Stress Management: Enhance your well-being by reducing stress and building resilience
Stress is inevitable. From frustration with traffic to fear brought on by a health scare, stress constantly intrudes in our lives. But the consequences of stress don’t have to be inevitable as well. You can counteract the damaging effects of stress by calling upon your body’s rich potential for self-healing. Stress Management, a Special Health Report from Harvard Medical School, gives you the tools you need to limit and lessen stress. With this insightful and instructive report, you’ll master skills that can help you repel the consuming effects of stress and reclaim and restore inner peace.
The most dependable ways to regulate stress are physical and social rather than purely mental, he says. “People reach for a relaxation app and overlook that movement, sufficient sleep, exposure to daylight, and time with people they trust are often the more powerful levers. Regular exercise in particular is one of the best-validated stress and mood interventions we have.”
Social connection
Social connection is probably the longevity pillar people neglect most, Dr. Barzilai says. “People will track their macros and their step count to the decimal and never think to protect their friendships with the same intentionality, even though the survival data on relationships rival the data on much of what they are measuring,” he says.
If you’re feeling isolated, try to make connecting with others a regular commitment rather than a grand gesture, he says. “Begin with one recurring, low-pressure point of contact: a standing weekly call with one person, a class or volunteer commitment that puts you in the same room with the same faces again and again, a daily walk somewhere you will see neighbors. Pick one recurring contact and protect it like an appointment, and treat a few real relationships with the same seriousness you would give your blood pressure or your exercise.”
Which pillar of longevity is most important?The habits most strongly linked to living a longer, healthier life are also some of the simplest: move regularly, eat well, sleep sufficiently, manage stress, and stay connected to others. But which one counts most? It’s impossible to gauge, says Dr. David Barzilai, a longevity physician and lecturer at Harvard Medical School.“How much each pillar matters depends heavily on where a given person is starting from,” he says. “For someone sedentary, adding movement is transformative. For someone running on five ragged hours of sleep, fixing sleep will do more than another workout. For someone isolated, rebuilding connection may be the highest-yield change of all.”“What I can say with confidence is that the most underrated pillar is social connection, and the most foundational day to day are sleep, physical activity, and nutrition, since they are the ground the others stand on,” Dr. Barzilai adds. “But the useful question is not which pillar wins in the abstract. It is which one you are personally weakest in right now, because that is where your next improvement will pay off most.”
Maureen Salamon is the executive editor of Harvard Women’s Health Watch. She also writes for the Harvard Health Letter, Harvard Heart Letter, and Harvard Men’s Health Watch, as well as for Harvard Health Publishing’s flagship website. … See Full Bio
David Barzilai, MD, PhD, MBA, MS, DipABLM, Contributor
Dr. David Barzilai is a longevity medicine physician and Harvard Medical School lecturer focused on advancing healthy longevity through evidence-based and precision medicine. He served as medical editor of Harvard Health Publishing’s Pathways to Longevity, its … See Full Bio
Lot 41 – MARKET DAY, ACHILL ISLAND (the now Deserted Village of Slievemore on Achill) by George Bryant Campion N.W.S. (1795 – 1870) Estimate: €1,850 – €2,250
Every year, huge amounts of valuable nutrients are flushed down our toilets. Yet farmers depend on many of those same nutrients, including nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium, to grow food.
At the same time, Europe continues to rely heavily on mineral fertilizers, even as fertilizer prices have risen sharply in recent years.
So why do we go to such lengths to produce and mine nutrients for food, only to flush some of them away afterward?
Recovering nutrients from urine, feces and sewage
Around the world, researchers are developing technologies to turn human waste into fertilizer.
In Sweden, researchers have developed toilets that separate urine from other waste at the source. The collected urine can then be stabilized and dried into a concentrated fertilizer product that is easier for farmers to transport and use.
Similar ideas are being tested elsewhere.
Human feces can also be turned into fertilizer. On an organic farm in Mexico, feces from dry toilets is mixed with materials such as straw and composted for several months. High temperatures during composting help destroy pathogens, leaving behind a soil-like fertilizer that can be used to grow vegetables.
At Germany’s Emscher Mündung wastewater treatment plant, the SUSKULT project is testing how nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium can be recovered from wastewater and turned into liquid fertilizer.
Around 1,000 liters (some 260 gallons) of wastewater flow through the plant every second. Researchers estimate that recovering just 10% of its nutrient potential could provide enough nutrients to grow around 3% of the tomatoes Germany consumes in a year.
On Chinese President Xi Jinping’s Washington trip, his wife Peng Liyuan is his soft power superweapon, projecting a gentler, more approachable image of China, despite its disputes with the United States over everything from trade to Taiwan
Angela Duckworth changed the way millions of people think about success with her bestselling book Grit. Now, nearly a decade later, she says there’s another major piece of the puzzle: your situation. In her new book, Situated: Find the People and Places That Bring Out Your Best, Duckworth explains why success isn’t simply a matter of intelligence, talent or willpower. The people around us, the environments we choose and even seemingly small details of our daily lives can shape what we think, feel and ultimately do. Duckworth joins Michael Smerconish to revisit the meaning of grit, explain her “situation → thoughts → response” model, and discuss why changing your circumstances can sometimes be more effective than trying harder to change yourself. Can grit be learned? How much control do we really have over our behavior? And have you set yourself up for success? Subscribe for more conversations with independent thinkers.
Illustration: Sarah Grillo/Axios. Stock: Getty Images
China is America’s only real AI competition — and, despite its weaknesses, it has some serious, structural advantages.
Why it matters: China leads in the physical ingredients for scaling AI: power, materials, robots and cheap models people actually use. These are the key ingredients for turning superhuman intelligence into real economic and military power.
Think of it this way:If they catch up — or lap us — on AI capabilities and chip production, they’re way better positioned to instantly impose and roll it out across society. In fact, they’re beating us there, too (more on that below).
Their edge exists thanks to:
Power: Electricity is the biggest bottleneck on America’s AI buildout, and China is swimming in it. BloombergNEF estimates China will add almost six times as much generating capacity as the U.S. over the next five years.
Vital materials: China dominates the minerals AI hardware runs on. The IEA tracks 20 essential ones for building AI and adjacent tech — and China dominates all but one, usually by huge margins. They have applied export controls to half of them as a way to slow us down.
Rolling out robots: This is where AI truly meets the real work. More than half of all industrial robots installed worldwide in 2024 went to China. They dominate us on this one. Better AI will equal better robots.
Cheap, widespread adoption: Chinese open-source models are the world’s default for developers building cheaply. Five of the six most popular models on OpenRouter, a leading AI marketplace, come from Chinese firms.
Land-and-sky autonomy: They’re simply crushing us on self-driving cars and self-flying drones. China’s DJI alone has over 70% of the global drone market.
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Flocks of nomadic sheep might be Europe’s oldest fix for extreme wildfires
Extensive grazing could help protect landscapes from one of the most destructive impacts of climate change, but shepherds need more support.
Mixed flock of sheep and goats grazing in Sierra de Cazorla, Segura and Las Villas Nature Reserve, Spain’s largest protected natural area. Emerson Mendoza Ayala Share
Nunzio Marcelli narrowly avoided a tree root before pulling his car to a stop on a mountainside in central Italy where his sheep have grazed for more than 40 years. The 2,800-meter Majella massif is visible through the sparse tree cover, the snowcapped peaks dominating the landscape.
Marcelli, his 1,500 sheep, 50 herding dogs, and the few dozen people he employs at his agricultural firm in the hilltop town of Anversa degli Abruzzi are some of the last vestiges of a nomadic pastoral tradition pre-dating the founding of Rome. It’s a practice that could also be Europe’s best unheralded tool to curb the extreme wildfires that have ravaged the continent year after year.
Climate change has supercharged heatwaves in the Mediterranean and caused prolonged droughts, leaving vegetation severely dehydrated. Rural land abandonment in recent decades and dwindling pastoral activities have also allowed trees, shrubs, and tall grasses to encroach across grasslands, turning swathes of southern Europe’s countryside into highly flammable tinderboxes.
Scientists and herders say encouraging more extensive grazing can help manage landscapes and stem the tide of wildfires. But the current incentive structure rewards large-scale, intensive operations that can guarantee high yields, rather than the extensive grazing practices that tend to be most beneficial to the land. For pastoralism to survive in modern Europe, shepherds say, it will require subsidies and targeted assistance from national governments and the European Union—support that has so far failed to gain traction among policymakers.
Transhumant shepherd Nunzio Marcelli tends a flock of around 1,500 sheep near Anversa degli Abruzzi, Italy. Tristan Bove
Roving fire brigades
Transhumance—from the Latin trans, meaning across, and humus, earth—refers to the shepherding of livestock between winter pastures at low altitudes or latitudes to summer ones on mountain summits. A form of extensive grazing, where grazers cover wide swathes of land at low intensity, transhumance stands out for its seasonal nature and the long distances shepherds and their flocks tend to travel, traditionally on foot.
Here in the valleys and canyons of central Italy, Marcelli’s sheep remove vegetation that would have otherwise covered everything from the winding track his Jeep barely fits through to the wide clearings free of tall grasses and shrubbery.
“All of this is open because of grazers,” Marcelli said. “It’s the result of an age-old tradition that has kept this territory going for thousands of years.”
But the animals chewing their way across Italy’s mountains—and the goats, sheep, and cows grazing on ancient routes throughout southern Europe—are doing much more than keeping culture alive. The time-honored practice may have also given the land a vital tool to protect itself against wildfires.
“Fire won’t ever come here,” Marcelli said confidently. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for many other parts of Europe.
A wildfire burns in northern Portugal in August 2024. Through early September of this year, 650,000 hectares across Europe have been burned by wildfires. Neal Haddaway
In 2025, nearly 8,000 wildfires scorched more than one million hectares of land in Europe, according to the European Forest Fire Information System, representing the worst wildfire year ever recorded on the continent. The 2026 season has so far seen marginally fewer fires, but around 650,000 hectares have burned as of early September, more than double the long-term average of the last 20 years.
Despite fewer fires across the continent than the previous year, the 2026 wildfire season has still set records in individual countries, some of which have had to deal with fires of unprecedented severity.In Spain and France, historically destructive fires have burned through around 300,000 hectares this summer. Devastating blazes in July surrounded the cities of Bordeaux in France and Madrid and Valencia in Spain, at one point forcing over 300,000 evacuations in affected areas.
In some cases, these large wildfires ripped through areas once tended by grazing animals. The fire that raged around Bordeaux in July gained strength tearing through the Landes, a man-made forest of monocultured pine trees planted across some 4,000 square miles of land in the 19th century to support the area’s timber industry. The region was formerly a patchwork of marshes and moorlands routinely grazed by local livestock and feral animals, and a stop on ancient transhumance pathways linking lowlands in southwestern France with the Pyrenees mountains.
Modern forms of intensive grazing can be damaging to environmental health due to overstocking and overuse of static plots of land, but a growing body of research suggests the loss of practices like transhumance could have a similarly detrimental effect. Moving herds through seasonal ranges helps clear up dry vegetation without pushing pastures into an overgrazed state. The pathways carved by transhumant herds over create a system of natural firebreaks that make isolated spot fires less likely to explode into a full-blown inferno.
“You trample an area, you disturb the vegetation, but you let it grow again—and you get this mosaic of different habitats.” Guy Pe’er, German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research
A 2021 report for EU policymakers referred to grazing animals as “cost-efficient ‘fire brigades’” that can help regulate dry vegetation’s buildup and maintain open spaces to act as fire breaks. The report covered all forms of extensive grazing and refers to animals roaming and foraging widely over loosely controlled pastures and rangelands.
As a seasonal variant of extensive grazing, transhumance can also help increase biodiversity, according to Guy Pe’er, a biologist at the German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research and lead author of the report.
“In transhumant systems, you have very intensive grazing for a short period—you trample an area, you disturb the vegetation, but you let it grow again—and you get this mosaic of different habitats,” Pe’er said.
The consequences of losing transhumant grazers were documented in a 2022 study of the ecological impacts that followed the loss of seasonal grazing in Spain’s Cantabrian Mountains. The researchers found that plots of land deprived of transhumant grazers suffered decreased plant diversity and lower soil fertility, as well as faster encroachment of shrubs and woody plants that can build up into fuel loads for wildfires.
Nevertheless, these practices are in worrying decline in Europe. Although there are some limited policies and funding in place to support young agriculturalists, they are not designed to encourage the most beneficial types of grazing.
Julián López’s flock of sheep graze in public lands near Cazorla, Spain. Emerson Mendoza Ayala
Broken incentives
At 1340 meters, in the heart of the Sierras de Cazorla, Segura y Las Villas Natural Park, lies the municipality with the highest number of transhumant herders in Andalusia and the largest sheep population in the province of Jaén: Santiago-Pontones.
Before the arrival of winter each year, around 60 transhumant herders drive some 40,000 head of cattle from the Sierra de Segura to the balmy, peaceful pastures of the Sierra Morena, where they graze for about six months. When the temperature starts to rise, they retrace their steps back to the mountains. For more than five centuries, their return has heralded the arrival of summer.
“When it comes to transhumance and generational succession, we are a rare bird in the area, and I would even say at a national level,” Antonio Rodríguez García, mayor of the municipality and a shepherd, explained. Here, “transhumance is a form of cultural resistance.”
The continuation of this practice in Santiago-Pontones is strongly linked to the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy, the bloc’s signature agriculture subsidy scheme, which supports young agriculturalists by providing targeted financial aid and grants to start new businesses. “Many young people have joined farming in recent years thanks to the support available for young farmers,” Rodríguez said. Rodríguez decided to follow in his father’s footsteps when he announced his retirement and swapped nursing for transhumant herding after Covid.He’s now applying to the start-up grant for new young farmers just before turning 40, the age limit.
“Transhumance is a form of cultural resistance.” Antonio Rodríguez García, mayor of Santiago-Pontones
But Rodríguez is in an anomaly.The decks are still stacked against traditional shepherds. Common Agricultural Policy subsidies account for 50 percent of farm incomes across the EU, but do not differentiate industrial farming from mobile pastoralism. Subsidy calculations penalize open grazing, meaning that shepherds often earn less by letting animals roam free, according to Júlio Sá Rêgo, a researcher in environmental and rural anthropology in Portugal’s Central region.
New young shepherds soon realize they must overcome countless bureaucratic hurdles, such as ascertaining land ownership, leasing grazing land, and even obtaining aid for disease-related losses—like the 2025 blue tongue outbreak—which discourages them from pursuing shepherding.
“I talk more with the agricultural advisor than with my family,” said Julián López, a 40-year-old shepherd from Cazorla who wanders every day through the municipality’s public lands to graze his flock, instead of moving herds seasonally to the Sierra Morena as his ancestors did, because doing so “is not cost-effective.”
In addition, any earnings from artisanal dairy produce are erased by the grueling, round-the-clock working hours and high systemic risks that transhumant shepherds face from livestock disease and extreme weather.
Physical barriers are also challenging. Fences increasingly enclose land as rural areas are privatized and modernized, while traditional paths become impassable due to overgrowth, deterioration, and neglect.
Some shepherds persevere despite these difficulties, although they may take a few shortcuts.
Sheep being transported by truck in Portugal. Some transhumant shepherds have adapted traditional grazing practices to the pressures of modern economics. Neal Haddaway
About 250 kilometers away from Santiago-Pontones, in the neighboring province of Córdoba, the 1,300 sheep belonging to Javier Guerrero Vilches, a 28-year-old transhumant shepherd from Santiago-Pontones, rest in the shade of the olive trees in the Sierra de Cardeña y Montoro Natural Park.
It would take Guerrero between 12 and 15 days to cover the distance from Santiago-Pontones with the flock, whereas he only needs about five hours to make the trip by lorry because traditional transhumance “isn’t economically viable, nor does it bring me any profit,” he points out.
Despite his father’s refusal to let him become a shepherd because “he didn’t want me to spend my whole life feeling miserable, exploited, and penniless,” Guerrero dropped out of secondary school. He now proudly represents the third generation of transhumant shepherds in his family, determined to work towards improving conditions in his profession and putting an end to prejudices against shepherds.
Javier Guerrero Vilches is a third-generation transhumant shepherd. Emerson Mendoza Ayala
“These social perceptions cross time,” said Sá Rêgo. “They still have the mentality of the flock keeper and discourage their kids from going into pastoralism.”
Some shepherds have come up with creative solutions to make their profession more lucrative. The Italian shepherd Marcelli established an agricultural firm and diversified into an export business and tourism, inviting people to accompany the herd during the day, before a shuttle comes to drive them back to town for the night.
He’s simultaneously preserving the transhumant tradition and helping mitigate wildfires.
In Andalusia, Guerrero has diversified his income, capitalizing on the added value of grazing in olive groves, by selling organic extra virgin olive oil made from local Picual olives packaged in sheep’s wool, and is considering offering ecotourism and gastronomic experiences.
Andalusian Segureña sheep rest in the shade of an almond tree grove in Santiago-Pontones, Jaén. Emerson Mendoza Ayala
Others are working to improve the structural political and economic situation for shepherds. Mayor Rodríguez said his greatest achievement to date has been securing an agreement with the Andalusian Regional Government to stop charging shepherds for grazing on public land. “It is completely anachronistic that we have been paying around 150,000 euros to clear the 70,000 hectares of woodland we manage to prevent fires,” he said.
Just having shepherds willing to do the job and live in the mountains might make a difference. In 2022, a stray lightning bolt struck a desiccated tree above Marcelli’s ranch. The dried wood ignited, and a fire quickly started spreading. But a shepherd watching a flock of sheep was able to warn the authorities.
Tristan Bove is a freelance science and environmental journalist and photographer. He has written for the Washington Post, Al Jazeera, and the … Read More
Emerson Mendoza Ayala is a travel and environmental investigative journalist and audiovisual communicator from Spain. He specializes in … Read More
Neal Haddaway is an environmental photographer from the UK. He has a PhD in conservation biology and has conducted research in the science-policy … Read More
Their edge exists thanks to:
