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    Heat will kill more than cold in Europe eventually

    By SETH BORENSTEIN - AP Science Writer | AP – Tue, Jun 21, 2011

    WASHINGTON (AP) — A new study says one of the few benefits of global warming — fewer deaths from the combination of extreme heat and cold — may eventually melt away in Europe.

    For years, scientists figured that with global warming there are fewer overall temperature-related deaths when those from heat waves and cold snaps are combined. The increase in heat wave deaths during hotter spells is more than offset by reduced cold deaths in milder winters.

    But a new study in Europe finds that around 2040, the increase in heat deaths will likely outweigh the reduction in cold deaths. The study suggests that by 2070, global warming may cause 15,000 more temperature-related deaths a year in Europe, which has less air conditioning than the United States.

    The study released Tuesday by Nature Communications looks only at deaths from heat and cold, not increases from flooding, droughts and storms. It used computer models to analyze the climate under global warming and compares those to death rates in 200 separate regions of Europe.

    The study's chief author, Joan Ballester, a climatologist at the Catalan Institute of Climate Sciences in Barcelona, said the same death assumptions cannot be made for other continents.

    Jonathan Patz, director of the Global Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin, said there seems to be fewer cold-related deaths in the United States than in Europe. That may mean that America will see heat deaths outweigh cold deaths sooner than Europe does, he said. Other experts say air conditioning in the U.S. is a big factor so that scenario is unlikely.

    Overall, the decreases in European temperature-related deaths "are going to be clearly lower than what was expected," Ballester said.

    Ballester's calculations show that starting around 2025, Europe will probably have the fewest temperature-related deaths in recent time, about 11,000 a year fewer than now. But then it increases back to current levels and by 2070, total temperature-related deaths will likely be higher.

    Some places in Europe will suffer more than others, Ballester calculates. Figures show that southern Europe, especially Italy, will suffer larger increases in heat deaths while overall temperature mortality will continue to fall in northern places like the United Kingdom and parts of Scandinavia.

    Patz, who wasn't part of the study, said Ballester's work "is really an essential paper in the field of climate change and health."

    ___

    Online:

    Nature Communications: http://www.nature.com/ncomms

     

    7 comments

    • Smooth Criminal
      Smooth Criminal  •  11 mths ago
      Throughout human history, cold has Always caused substantially more deaths than heat. By a wide margin. This is from empirical data, not a 'may' or 'could'.
      • tuco
        tuco 11 mths ago
        And then there are the famines from failed crops due to cold that would be indirect deaths from cold.
    • tbmbuzz
      tbmbuzz  •  11 mths ago
      What a crock! Leaving aside the issue of the manmade global warming hoax, which is supported only by models that hardly emulate the real world, not by real data, this "study" claims that the oh so modern advanced continent of Europe will not achieve any advancements in technology in the next 60 years. Liberal "logic" and "rational" thinking at its doom and gloom finest!
      • Eric1
        Eric1 11 mths ago
        GENEVA (Reuters) - The worst drought in 60 years in the Horn of Africa has sparked a severe food crisis and high malnutrition rates, with parts of Kenya and Somalia experiencing pre-famine conditions, the United Nations said on Tuesday.

        More than 10 million people are now affected in drought-stricken areas of Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Uganda and the situation is deteriorating, it said.

        "Two consecutive poor rainy seasons have resulted in one of the driest years since 1950/51 in many pastoral zones," Elisabeth Byrs, spokeswoman of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told a media briefing.

        "There is no likelihood of improvement (in the situation)until 2012," she said.

        Food prices have risen substantially in the region, pushing many moderately poor households over the edge, she said.

        A U.N. map of food security in the eastern Horn of Africa shows large swathes of central Kenya and Somalia in the "emergency" category, one phase before what the U.N. classifies as catastrophe/famine -- the fifth and worst category.

        Child malnutrition rates in the worst affected areas are more than double the emergency threshold of 15 percent and are expected to rise further, Byrs said.

        High mortality rates among children are reported, but she had no figures for the toll.

        Drought and fighting are driving ever greater numbers of Somalis from their homeland, with more than 20,000 arriving in Kenya in just the past two weeks, the U.N. refuge agency UNHCR said on Friday. It voiced alarm at the dramatic rise, noting the average monthly outflow had been about 10,000 so far this year.

        GET USED TO IT.... It is coming to our own fields soon.
    • imaluckydickens
      imaluckydickens  •  10 mths ago
      Libs will believe ANYTHING fed to them by their handlers.
    • tuco
      tuco  •  11 mths ago
      Liberalism will kill far more people than cold or heat. Remember al the old people that died from heat in France due to all the socialists abandoning the old people for their summer vacations? And then there are the global warming taxes that will make air conditioning too expensive to run. Then again it also makes it too expensive to heat your home. In England old people have to buy used books to burn for heat!
    • Eric1
      Eric1  •  11 mths ago
      GENEVA (Reuters) - The worst drought in 60 years in the Horn of Africa has sparked a severe food crisis and high malnutrition rates, with parts of Kenya and Somalia experiencing pre-famine conditions, the United Nations said on Tuesday.

      More than 10 million people are now affected in drought-stricken areas of Djibouti, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia and Uganda and the situation is deteriorating, it said.

      "Two consecutive poor rainy seasons have resulted in one of the driest years since 1950/51 in many pastoral zones," Elisabeth Byrs, spokeswoman of the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, told a media briefing.

      "There is no likelihood of improvement (in the situation)until 2012," she said.

      Food prices have risen substantially in the region, pushing many moderately poor households over the edge, she said.

      A U.N. map of food security in the eastern Horn of Africa shows large swathes of central Kenya and Somalia in the "emergency" category, one phase before what the U.N. classifies as catastrophe/famine -- the fifth and worst category.

      Child malnutrition rates in the worst affected areas are more than double the emergency threshold of 15 percent and are expected to rise further, Byrs said.

      High mortality rates among children are reported, but she had no figures for the toll.

      Drought and fighting are driving ever greater numbers of Somalis from their homeland, with more than 20,000 arriving in Kenya in just the past two weeks, the U.N. refuge agency UNHCR said on Friday. It voiced alarm at the dramatic rise, noting the average monthly outflow had been about 10,000 so far this year.

      GET USED TO IT, because there is MORE of this coming, and it will be in the US soon (the Southwest is ALREADY on fire).
    • Scrumble
      Scrumble  •  11 mths ago
      There is no such thing as global warming in our 6,000 year old universe. Only fools believe otherwise.
    • VoteNixonshead2012
      VoteNixonshead2012  •  11 mths ago
      AIDS, violence and Stupidity of Liberal Social Engineering *Sarah's law* will kill off more people than "Climate change"
     Post a comment
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