The global climate system is one of many large natural systems currently stressed by the weight of growing human populations and economic activity.
Weather and climate have many significant impacts on human health. They range from the less obvious to the obvious threats of temperature extremes and severe storms. Climate and temperature can also affect the quality of local water and food supplies, harming people’s health.
Long-term changes in temperature and weather patterns are referred to as climate change. These changes may be organic, but since the 1800s, human activity has been the primary cause of climate change.
This is mainly because burning fossil fuels, such as coal, oil, and gas, produces gases that trap heat. A population’s long-term well-being depends on the biosphere’s ecological and physical systems, also known as life-support systems.
The global climate system is one of many large natural systems currently stressed by the weight of growing human populations and economic activity.
According to the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, global temperature increases must be kept to 1.5°C to avoid catastrophic health impacts and millions of deaths from climate change. Increased global temperatures and other climate changes are inevitable due to past emissions.
Even 1.5°C of global warming due to climate change is not considered safe, and every tenth of a degree of warming will significantly impacts people’s lives and health.
Through heavy industry, toxic waste, or crop burning, air pollution has already claimed over 10 million lives and cost the world $8.1 trillion, with poorer communities bearing the brunt of the costs.
The right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, including the right to clean air, was recognized as a human right by the U.N. General Assembly in July 2022. Even though this issue is the subject of emerging legislation, much can still be done to enhance the health of the affected communities.
According to the Sustainable Development Goals, climate change is a major issue that is affecting the health of people around the globe. People in underdeveloped countries are at higher risk because they lack the health security and economic strength to maintain preventative measures.
Climate Sensitive Health Risks:
The health impacts of climate change already include disruption of food systems, increases in zoonotic and food-borne diseases, and water- and vector-borne diseases, as well as mental health issues.
Floods, storms, and other types of extreme weather are also becoming more frequent. In addition, climate change weakens many social factors that affect health, including livelihoods, equity, and access to health care.
These climate-sensitive health risks disproportionately affect the most vulnerable and disadvantaged groups, including women, children, ethnic minorities, poor communities, migrants or displaced individuals, older populations, and those with underlying health problems.
Health Risks increase with Global Warming:
Global warming is the gradual increase in average global surface temperatures caused by the rise in the concentration of GHGs (greenhouse gases) in the atmosphere.
The dangerous increase in greenhouse gas emissions is mainly caused by emissions from the fossil fuels we burn, such as coal and oil. As the oceans warm, weather and climate events change in timing, location, and intensity, and sea levels rise.
This is what we mean by climate change. Worldwide, the severity and frequency of extreme climate and weather events like droughts, floods, and heat waves are rising. These changes are causing large-scale health problems.
Over the past 50 years, the number of extreme weather events caused by climate change has increased five times, resulting in more than 2 million deaths.
• The prevalence of heat-related illnesses such as heat exhaustion, heat stroke, and chronic kidney disease is rising.
• The risks of extreme heat to maternal and newborn health, mental health, and chronic non-communicable diseases such as asthma and diabetes are increasing.
• The impacts of climate change on food and water supplies are already being felt in many parts of the world.
• Increased evaporation, altered precipitation patterns, and increasing amounts of snow falling as rain are all consequences of warming that threaten water security.
• Increased malnutrition rates are associated with reduced dietary diversity and sudden food production and access losses in many communities.
• In addition, the warmer climate offers perfect conditions for the growth of water-borne and food-borne diseases.
After 2050, regions dependent on glaciers and snowmelt may experience a 20% decrease in water availability for agriculture if temperatures rise by more than 2°C. In Asia alone, 800 million people depend on freshwater glaciers. As global warming continues, these phenomena will worsen, undoing years of progress in addressing the food and water insecurity that still affects the world’s most deprived populations.
Climate change is a significant contributing factor to the spread of diseases to new regions of the globe. Changes brought on by global warming can affect pathogens, vectors, and hosts in terms of their survival, reproduction, abundance, and distribution. Extreme weather can create the perfect environment for the spread of infectious diseases like cholera.
Additionally, as global temperatures rise, illnesses that were previously limited to warmer climates are also spreading throughout the world. It includes several vector-borne diseases such as dengue fever, West Nile virus, Lyme disease, and malaria.
Many newly emerging infectious diseases appear in these tropical areas, where the warm temperatures favor the lifecycles of both pathogens and vectors. There is an increasing risk to human health from vector-borne pathogens. And now they’re growing.
The increase in allergens and dangerous pollutants in our air is linked to climate change and higher temperatures.
This poses several health risks, including that pollen levels may be higher due to longer warm periods and higher levels of CO2 in the atmosphere, which may lead to more frequent and severe allergic reactions or asthma attacks. More and more wildfires will worsen air quality and expose people to more smoke, which is linked to an increase in respiratory and cardiovascular hospitalizations.
Air pollution increases when fossil fuels are burned for purposes such as transportation or manufacturing. Long-term exposure to these air pollutants can lead to lung cancer and chronic cardiovascular and respiratory diseases.
There will be no global distribution of these effects on air quality. For example, drought-prone areas are more likely to have poor air quality due to smoke from wildfires or dust blown from the ground. In contrast, cities may have higher levels of pollutants from traffic and industrial combustion.
Conclusion:
The ecological and physical systems of the biosphere are essential for a population’s long-term well-being. The global climate system is one of the many vast natural systems under stress. Extremes in temperature and severe storms are among the threats, ranging from less obvious to more obvious ones. Climate change has weakened numerous social factors, such as livelihoods, equity, and healthcare access.
In many regions of the world, the effects of climate change on food and water supplies are already evident. Water security is threatened by increased evaporation, altered precipitation patterns, and an increase in the amount of snow that rains.
This article is jointly authored by Hina Tu Zahra and Muhammad Sohail Sajid.