Climate change a major threat to global health: report

The threat climate change poses to human health is so great that it could wipe out the gains in global health made over the last 50 years, according to a new report.
The report shows that the direct health effects of climate change are linked to increased frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, especially heatwaves, floods, droughts and storms.
Indirect impacts come from changes in infection patterns, effects of emissions, uncertainty regarding the availability of food, and hence malnutrition.
However, getting to grips with climate change could also present major opportunities for global health, according to the report published in The Lancet journal.

"Impact of climate change on global health could be enormous, not only through the direct health effects, but also because of reduced social stability if people are forced to move or flee," said Peter Byass, professor of global health at Umea University in Sweden.
"Meanwhile, we know that mitigation and adaptation around climate change can have positive health effects, for example both by reducing emissions and improving dietary habits. Effective climate action may actually prove to be one of the greatest opportunities to also improve global health that we have ever had," said Byass.

Health effects can also be linked to people involuntarily forced to leave the affected areas or movements of people planned because of impending changes in living conditions.

Increased incidence of conflict is also a factor that the report highlights as a threat to global health.
But global efforts to reduce emissions can achieve positive co-benefits for health.
The report highlights a number of such points. These include reduced consumption of fossil fuels leading to lower incidence of respiratory diseases, as well as people walking and cycling more, which both reduce emissions and lower the incidence of obesity, diabetes, coronary heart disease, and stroke.
Even the consumption of red meat, the production of which is not very climate-friendly, is expected to decline and also bring health benefits as a result.

"Overall, a strong international consensus is needed to create a global economy in which we minimise carbon dioxide emissions. This in turn presents an opportunity to improve human health," said Maria Nilsson, researcher at the Division of Epidemiology and Global Health at Umea University, who is one of the report's main editors.