AMU Emergency Management Public Safety

Yearly Deaths Likely to Increase Due to Climate Change

Climate Change Impacts to Health

Climate change is altering weather patterns around the globe, many of which cause extreme events that pose a risk to the health and safety of individuals regardless if they live in rural, urban, or coastal island locations. Some of these extreme events include prolonged droughts, excessive floods, and heat waves.

A recent fact sheet from the World Health Organization (WHO) estimated that the impacts from climate change are likely to increase the number of yearly deaths by an estimated 250,000 between 2030 and 2050. Many of these deaths will likely be due to the disruptions in basic needs such as food, water, and clean air.

As temperatures around the globe continue to rise, higher heat and humidity increase the chance for vector-borne diseases, such as the dengue virus or malaria, mainly due to a longer transmission season and an expanded geographic range. A larger number of people will also develop allergies and asthma due to higher heat and humidity that decreases air quality by increasing the pollution in the air and extending pollen seasons.

An increase in extreme precipitation events will produce more frequent and more intense floods, pose a drowning risk, contaminate freshwater supplies, and offer additional areas for disease-bearing insects to breed. 

Also, higher temperatures and altered precipitation patterns will produce heat waves and prolonged droughts. Droughts negatively impact agricultural production, destabilizing food supplies, and creating famines. Lack of rainfall can affect freshwater supplies, diminishing its availability for personal hygiene and clean drinking water, placing individuals at an increased risk of water-borne diseases such as diarrhea.

Some populations will be more vulnerable than others

Although the numbers are approximate, the WHO estimates that of the additional 250,000 deaths related to climate change, heat exposure will result in elderly deaths of about 38,000, with another 60,000 people dying due to malaria, 48,000 to diarrhea, and 95,000 as a result of childhood malnutrition.

Some populations will be more vulnerable than others, including the elderly, children, and those individuals that live on small, developing island nations, other coastal locations, megacities, polar, and mountainous regions – all of which are likely to be impacted. Children in poor nations, the elderly or infirm, or those populations in nations where a weak public health infrastructure exists, will be especially vulnerable to impacts from climate change.

Plans by the WHO to help combat climate change impacts to health include developing partnerships with agencies to promote health within climate change agendas, raising awareness of the dangers that climate change poses to health, and assisting countries by supporting a coordinated public health response that builds capacity, while reducing the vulnerability of individual health to the impacts of climate change.

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Kimberly Arsenault serves as an intern at the Cleveland/Bradley County Emergency Management Agency where she works on plan revisions and special projects. Previously, Kimberly spent 15 years in commercial and business aviation. Her positions included station manager at the former Midwest Express Airlines, as well as corporate flight attendant, inflight manager, and charter flight coordinator. Kimberly currently holds a master's degree in emergency and disaster management from American Public University.

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