Climate Change Heightens Risk of Mosquito-Borne Disease Outbreaks

Rising global average temperatures due mainly to greenhouse gas emissions will contribute to increases in the distribution areas of four mosquito-borne viruses: Oropouche (OROV), Mayaro (MAYV), Rocio (ROCV), and St Louis encephalitis (SLEV).

Scientists use mathematical models to predict distribution
 areas by 2100 of four arboviruses: Oropouche, Mayaro, Rocio,
 and St Louis encephalitis. 

This finding is from a study published in the journal PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases. The research was conducted at Butantan Institute in São Paulo, Brazil, during Camila Lorenz’s PhD with support from FAPESP and supervision by Lincoln Suesdek, a professor in the Parasitology Department at the University of São Paulo’s Biomedical Science Institute (ICB–USP). Flávia Virginio, Thiago Salomão, Breno Aguiar and Francisco Chiaravalloti-Neto, researchers in the same university’s Public Health Department (FSP-USP), also took part.

Read the Science and Technology Research News story - "Climate Change Heightens Risk of Mosquito-Borne Disease Outbreaks.”

'Hacking' your carbon footprint

Measuring your carbon footprint (by Jen Luxton).

Many of the actions we take in our daily lives contribute to global warming. When we start a car, we’ve made a decision to change the Earth’s climate. This is also true when we eat lunch, book a flight, do the laundry, turn on the television, or flush the toilet. But the fossil fuels we consume tend to be hidden from our immediate experience, making them easy to take for granted.

Over the past few years I’ve been working to systematically reduce my impact. I didn’t set out to save the world; my reductions are a billion times too small for that. Instead, I’m motivated to avoid harming others, human and nonhuman, and it has become clear that burning fossil fuel does, in fact, harm others. I was also curious to see what life without all the fossil fuel would be like. It turns out that I like it better.

Read the Yes! story by Peter Kalmus - “Real Life Hacks to Cut Your Carbon Footprint (Plus: A Personal Emissions Calculator).”