Climate change is 'a true public health emergency,' according to medical groups
Doctors and scientists have long been aware of the harm to health caused by our overheating world.
In 2017, the American Public Health Association announced the “Year of Climate Change and Health.” Executive Director Georges Benjamin said, “If anyone doesn’t think this is a severe problem, they are fooling themselves.”
The Medical Consortium on Climate and Health, a group formed in 2017 by 11 medical associations representing over half of U.S. doctors, published its first report: “Medical Alert! Climate Change Is Harming Our Health!” It emphasized that the “most important action we can take to protect our health is to reduce heat-trapping pollution by reducing energy waste and accelerating the inevitable transition to clean renewable energy.”
Also in that year, the American Medical Association adopted a policy stressing the reality of climate change and the need for physicians to take a role in protecting public health affected by it.
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In 2019, health groups including the American Medical Association, America's Physician Groups and the American Academy of Nursing produced a climate change agenda calling the issue “a true public health emergency.”
In a special report last October, the World Health Organization referred to climate change as “the single biggest health threat facing humanity.”
In June 2022, the American Medical Association created a more aggressive policy that “mobilizes the AMA to advocate for policies that limit global warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius, reduce U.S. greenhouse gas emissions aimed at carbon neutrality by 2050, and support rapid implementation and incentivization of clean energy solutions and significant investments in climate resilience through a climate justice lens.”
On June 16, the New England Journal of Medicine expanded its coverage of the intersection of climate issues and public health. An author, Professor Kari Nadea, said “we need to really focus our efforts on communicating how to mitigate and adapt to climate change. . . . The time is now, it’s urgent and we can do something about it.”
Studies in the United States, Europe, and Australia have associated exposure to wildland fire smoke with asthma and COPD increases and hospitalizations, congestive heart failure events and overall mortality. According to Jonathan Patz, director of the Global Health Institute at the University of Wisconsin, an analysis of the Clean Air Act, one the more than 100 bills that Donald Trump deregulated, found a benefit level 30 times greater than the cost.
Heavier downpours in a hotter world wash fertilizers and animal waste into rivers, lakes and oceans where they increase algae, viruses and bacteria. Drinking or swimming in contaminated water or eating fish from it can cause diarrhea, vomiting and more severe reactions. In 2014, a toxic algal bloom in Lake Erie required shutting down the Toledo water supply.
Mycotoxins are toxic metabolites produced by multiple species of molds that can develop in crops and food under humidity and temperature increases. It is believed that future climate change will greatly increase them.
Bug-borne diseases such as Lyme, West Nile, Chagas, dengue, chikungunya and Zika are spreading. Rising temperatures have shortened the breeding cycle of mosquitoes, causing them to increase, and have more than tripled their life span. This longer life allows them to pass on to their offspring the ability to transmit the diseases they carry.
Crops will have less food value since more CO2 in the atmosphere increases carbohydrates in plants and lessens nutrients and protein.
Climate change is also a threat to mental health. People who survive the worst extreme weather events — especially children, the poor, the elderly and those with existing mental health disorders — experience despair, anger, depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and suicidal thoughts and behavior.
A 2017 study linked the 60,000 suicides by farmers in India to climate change, which devastates crops by drought and floods. Suicides have also increased among American farmers as climate conditions worsen.
Coal, a major contributor to global overheating, causes serious health harm, including bronchitis, emphysema, asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, heart attacks, arrhythmias, congestive heart failure, strokes, loss of intelligence and melanoma for frequent eaters of fish in water contaminated with the methyl-mercury caused by burning coal.
Extreme heat events can trigger heat stroke, which can cause death or permanent disability. Small children, the elderly, people with chronic diseases, low-income populations and outdoor workers are especially at risk. Higher temperatures and respiratory problems are also linked.
It’s long past time for our government to cut the heat-trapping gas emissions that increasingly endanger our health. Let’s demand that they do.
John Ward lives in Gainesville.
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This article originally appeared on The Gainesville Sun: John Ward: Climate change is a public health emergency
