Climate change and the public health dilemma in India

India is the second largest country in the world by population and is rapidly catching up to China. At the best of times, a lack of adaptive capacity coupled with limited resources to help bolster health infrastructure have made it extremely challenging for the country to cope with the spread of illness and disease. Climate change is now making things far worse. India is an especially fascinating case study in this regard due to its diverse array of temperate zones. From the Himalayas in the far north, to coastal megacities, to deserts where the 50° Celsius mark is regularly breached, the nation is consistently ranked as one of the most vulnerable to climate change. 

Climate change is making life in India particularly difficult.

This paper explores the implications for human health arising from these vulnerabilities. It argues that the extreme temperatures being seen across India are rendering some areas entirely uninhabitable, with the further risk of death following exposure even for several hours. This is compounded by the increasing number of people with respiratory diseases resulting from air pollution, in turn stemming from the country’s single-minded pursuit of economic growth predicated on fossil fuels. Moreover, malaria and cholera epidemics are expected to continue, with easy access to dirty water and increased temperatures creating expanded breeding grounds for disease-carrying vectors. Severe mental health consequences will also be discussed.

Read the story from the Climate Institute by Marcus Arcarnjo - “Climate change and the public health dilemma in India."

A New Report Finds That Climate Change is the World’s Worst Public Health Crisis

A report released Wednesday by the Lancet Countdown calls climate change “the biggest global health threat of the 21st century,” and warns that if it is not addressed, disease, poor air quality, and food insecurity will threaten millions of people. 

Pollution from recent wildfires forced people in
San Francisco to wear face masks outdoors.

The report, written by a team of international researchers, focuses on several climate-related impacts, including extreme heat and its effect on labor productivity and the spread of disease. In 2017, 153 billion hours of labor were lost due to heat—an increase of more than 62 billion hours since 2000. This correlates with a rise in exposure to heat waves and extreme weather events such as hurricanes and wildfires that have already made thousands of climate refugees and are expected to create millions more.

Many of those refugees, one of the report’s author notes, are American. In a press call on Tuesday, Renee Salas, a doctor of emergency medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital and lead author of the Lancet Countdown US Brief, described a recent experience close to home. “I had a patient who came from Puerto Rico, came with bag of luggage, bag of medication she hasn’t taken in days. She was truly a climate refugee who was in my emergency department,” Salas said. “I can’t think of a population more at risk of health effects than a displaced individual.”

Read the Mother Jones story by Rowan Walrath and Rebecca Leber - “A New Report Finds That Climate Change is the World’s Worst Public Health Crisis.”

A warmer climate could make your dog sick

Canine heartworm disease is caused by long worms that live in a dog’s heart and blood vessels. It can be fatal. And a warming climate could make this disease more common.

A warmer climate could make your dog sick.

Heartworm is transmitted by mosquitoes. So it’s most common in warm, moist areas such as the southeastern United States.

But as the climate changes, other parts of the country may see more mosquitoes, and the mosquito season may get longer.

Read the Yale Climate Connections story by Samantha Harrington - “A warmer climate could make your dog sick.”

Frogs show signs of immunity to chytrid fungus pandemic that has wiped out about 200 species

A disease caused by a highly contagious fungus has wiped out as many as 200 species of frog worldwide since the 1970s, and pushed many more to the brink of extinction.

The Panamanian golden frog is presumed to be extinct in the wild.

But researchers now believe that some frogs may be developing a resistance to the deadly chytrid fungus.

When chytridiomycosis wiped through a biodiversity hotspot called El Cope in Panama in 2004, scientists said the spread was so rapid that, in places, dead frogs littered the forest floor.

In the study published today in Science, researchers have documented the recovery of nine frog species in three regions of Panama, including El Cope, and have observed infected frogs showing no ill effects from the fungus.

Read the ABC News story by Nick Kilvert - “Frogs show signs of immunity to chytrid fungus pandemic that has wiped out about 200 species.”

Are You a Wizard or a Prophet?

The term “GMO” can be a Rorschach test. It makes some people see potential for plants that can grow in any ecosystem, resist drought and disease, and yield massive amounts of food and prosperity for all. Human innovation, this camp says, can get us out of any jam.

But many environmentalists see a racket that will give mega-corporations control over the world’s food supply and encourage thoughtless consumption. We are part of the Earth’s global ecosystem, the second group contends, we can’t “bio-hack” our way out of every problem.

In his latest book, The Wizard and the Prophet: Two Remarkable Scientists and Their Dueling Visions to Shape Tomorrow’s World, journalist Charles C. Mann traces current incarnations of these world views to two 20th-century figures — agronomist Norman Borlaug and ecologist/activist William Vogt. Both men were unlikely scientists, and both have left their fingerprints all over environmental thought.

Read the story by Diana Crow form Neo.Life - “Are You a Wizard or a Prophet?”

Climate change raises concerns about disease spread

Sonia Altizer - she is
concerned about climate
and the spread of disease.

Climate change has many implications, but among the most least understood is the rising opportunity it brings for the spread of disease.

A recent Climate Desk report headed: “Climate Change boosts disease spread”, warned that we sometimes forget that one of consequence of climate change is the likely way for diseases to spread.

It notes, though, that the natural world offers stark reminders.

Sonia Altizer from the University of Georgia in the US, and her colleagues has urged that humans learn from the interactions in nature.

Writing in Science magazine, she argued that climate change is affecting the spread of disease worldwide.