CC is [already] Bad for your Health... “Climate change is happening, and it’s a health issue today for millions worldwide,” said Anthony Costello, a co-chairman of the commission that produced the report, called The Lancet Countdown.
...climate change is already affecting human health in serious ways, with harms “far worse than previously understood.” The report argues that the health professions have a responsibility “to communicate the threats and opportunities” of a phenomenon that is “central to human well-being.”
...human-caused global warming “threatens to undermine the past 50 years of gains in public health.” But the report also said that a comprehensive approach to slow the planet’s warming could be “the great health opportunity of the 21st century.”
...outdoor labor capacity in rural areas fell, on average, by 5.3 percent over the past 16 years because of heat stress and other conditions making work more difficult. That is a stunning loss of productivity, and directly attributable to global warming during a period when nine of the 10 of the hottest years on record were recorded.
Productivity fell 2 percent from 2015 to 2016 alone.
In 2015, the Lancet report says, an additional 175 million people over the age of 65 were exposed to heat waves, when compared with broad trends of the past 20 years.
... lower-income countries experience far greater economic loss as a proportion of their gross domestic product because of climate-related disasters when compared to higher-income countries.
...From 1990 to 2016, uninsured losses in low-income countries were equivalent to over 1.5 percent of their G.D.P.
...recent gains in combating the spread of these diseases [are] now being threatened by climate change.
The report shows that transmission of dengue fever by just two types of mosquito has increased 3 percent and 5.9 percent, since 1990, the result of a broad range of factors including climate change...
If the report contained just these findings, it would still be an alert to public health officials. But there are dozens of other examples that clearly show that climate change is no longer a distant, future threat.
It is here, now.
This is now a medical and public health fight, not just an environmental one.
(My emphases)
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/30/opin ... eft-regionI also noticed this headline at WaPo, but it's paywalled. Anyone with access there wana copy some of it's juiciest content here??
"Climate change fueling disasters, disease in ‘potentially irreversible’ ways, report warns"