Killer heatwaves and disease outbreaks are key threats to Queenslanders from climate change, according to a State Government-funded plan calling for tobacco-style taxes on carbon polluters.

The new statewide strategy to tackle climate-driven health risks argued doctors could play a role as "highly trusted" messengers about climate impacts to the community, where politicians have failed.

The plan, obtained by the ABC ahead of its launch today by Queensland Health Minister Steven Miles, revealed the health sector regarded a lack of political support — including mixed messages from the Government's own pro-coal and gas development decisions — as the key barrier to adapting to climate change.

Rising temperatures brought in increased risk of mosquito-borne diseases, the plan found. ( Muhammad Mahdi Karim/Wikimedia Commons )

The Human Health and Wellbeing Climate Change Adaptation Plan, part of the State Government's strategy to cut net carbon emission to zero by 2050, urged top bureaucrats and executives to factor in health impacts when assessing mining, energy and waste projects.

The plan, developed by Griffith University's National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility (NCCARF) and the Climate and Health Alliance (CAHA), found heat stress among children and the elderly was the health sector's main concern for the future.

It said the Government should consider "redirection of subsidies that support activities harmful to health and climate stability, and application of levies or taxes on external drivers".

It cited the polluter-pays principle for the health and environmental costs of activities "which traditionally have not been accounted for".

Farming communities would be increasingly vulnerable to stock loss and drought, the plan found. ( ABC News: Franklin Hood )

The next most pressing concern was increasing disease outbreaks beyond the tropical north via food, water and mosquitos.

Vulnerable communities included farmers, who faced mental distress from crop and stock losses, and aged people in far north Queensland.

Other climate-driven health concerns were "food and water insecurity, malnutrition, worsening chronic, cardiovascular and respiratory conditions, and children's health and development".

The plan's priorities included public education that "must focus on disadvantaged groups who are most at risk from climate-related pressures".

It said professional health and medical groups could help by lifting their profile in the public debate around climate change.

"As a highly trusted source of credible information, the health and medical community can advance community understanding of climate change and its health impacts, and the message that climate solutions are a health priority and will provide health benefits,' the plan stated.

Climate change will have a "massive impact" on aged care, Uniting Care Queensland said. ( ABC News: Natasha Johnson )

Mr Miles said doctors and nurses "almost certainly could do a better job than politicians" who had let the community down on the issue.

"If you just looked at the media and listened to politicians, you'd think (climate change) was contested, you'd think there was an argument each way. Well of course, there isn't," he told the ABC.

David Rissik, the lead author of the plan at NCCARF, told the ABC health professionals were ideally placed to speak truth to power about climate change and win community backing.

"These are people who are seeing the real issues coming in front of them, they're seeing the heat illness during hot weather, people who are starting to suffer from mental illness because of issues related to extreme events or because of heatwaves," he said.

"We're getting a lot of different mixed messages from different parts of the media, from different areas around Australia, different politicians, and we really need the science to drive the debate.

"Only if we can get the community on side and really driving the debate forward will we get the significant changes that are required to start to address climate change."

Dr Rissick said another recommendation was to collect data on the health costs of climate change "so we can actually work out if we adapt, what are the costs we avoided".

"That really starts to talk to people's hip pockets."

Carbon polluters could be forced to pay under the latest Queensland climate plan. ( AAP: Julian Smith )

He said adaptation to climate change would be expensive and "we certainly think a range of different things need to be considered including taxing carbon".

John Rainbird from the Torres Strait Regional Authority said small rises in temperature triggered critical heat stress in the far north, especially for people with diabetes or cardiovascular issues.

He said rising sea levels were already adding to mental health problems in Torres Strait through the "anxiety that local people feel over the loss of their homes and their ancestors' land".

Judene Andrews from Uniting Care Queensland, the state's largest aged care provider, said climate change had "a massive impact on us and our ability to deliver services in terms of staff, infrastructure and increase in demand".

The plan revealed more than a third of the health sector baulked at moves to adapt to climate change because of a lack of clear political leadership and "fear of policy reversal and withdrawal of resources".

It cited a "lack of consistent State Government policy", with the Palaszczuk government's own climate adaptation strategy contradicted by "pro-coal and gas development decisions".

Mr Miles said the Government had sought to "represent the bests interests of the entire community".

He said there was a limit to state moves to force carbon polluters to shoulder future health costs and there needed to be a national carbon price to determine which projects should proceed.