Opinion: An open letter to Rep. Chuck Edwards about climate change and politics

Dear Rep. Chuck Edwards:

I would like to address the environmental and health impacts of climate change from a physician’s perspective and explain why it is imperative that "time is of the essence." As my elected representative to the House, I have been impressed with your strong work ethic. I am looking forward to your Congressional representation of the people from our mountainous Western North Carolina region.

We live in a region of abundant natural beauty that shares an interdependence with the rest of the world with the impact of industrial emissions. Climate change is caused by humans, specifically by greenhouse gases in our atmosphere like carbon dioxide and other products of fossil-fuel combustion. These greenhouse gases help to keep the heat from the sun from leaving our atmosphere. Not only do the greenhouse gases linger in the atmosphere for a long time, their levels have been shown to be rising rapidly over the past 20 years as does the average temperature of the atmosphere.

In the Jan. 19 Asheville Citizen Times interview by Joel Burgess, you said that “there is a an awful lot of hysteria being built around climate change right now. Statistics that I see regularly are that we've not seen the earth's surface change over the last 100 years more than a degree. And that leads me to proceed with caution.”

The newspaper added a clarification from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that the earth’s surface temperature is actually 1.90 degrees Fahrenheit (or 1.06 degrees Celsius) warmer than the average between 1880-1900, which corresponds to the rise of industrialization in America. Therefore, your statement is true if you meant 1-degree Celsius. However, the air temperature is commonly reported as degrees Fahrenheit in the U.S. so this assertion can cause much confusion depending on the interpretation of the temperature scale.

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Even though a 1-degree Celsius increase in the average Earth surface temperature might seem inconsequential, the difference for life on Earth could be huge. Scientists caution that for every tenth of a degree of average temperature rise, the environmental impact gets worse with an increase in the number of extreme events and health-related catastrophes. The average surface temperature has been trending upward at an alarming rate since the 1960s. In fact, the 10 warmest years in all recorded history have occurred since 2010. At the current rate, the average surface temperature of the earth will increase by 2 degrees Celsius (or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) by 2100.

If unchecked, the average global surface temperature will exceed 1.5 degrees Celsius soon. Most scientists predict a number of devastating environmental catastrophes will occur with this increase. Warming of the oceans will cause melting ice with rising oceans, flooded cities, the loss of many islands and the death of the coral reefs. Warmer air carries more moisture in it which leads to more extreme weather events that can result in more precipitation and flooding. More heat waves mean more drought and starvation.

The average temperature is slowly rising not only making the warm summer months even warmer, but extending the warm season through the fall and spring. Conversely, the cooler winter months are becoming warmer too resulting in more ice and less snow. Asheville’s climate will have more extreme episodes of heat, more periods of drought, yet more extreme rain events and more total rainfall annually.

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Climate change can impact health though more climate extremes, reduced air quality, damaging food production systems, decreasing safe water resources, and increasing insect vectors. These climate drivers impact the environment because of more forest fires around the city, more floods within the city and the surrounding community, and our region can become a larger breeding ground for insects that can cause disease in humans. Climate change can result in more health impacts due to heat-related illness (such as heat stroke and cardiopulmonary illness), vector borne disease (like Lyme disease, West Nile virus, and malaria), injuries, and mental health problems (due to economic loss, job loss, and stress).

Climate change is defined by scientists and should be understood by politicians so that appropriate management can result in appropriate policies in order to best serve the health and welfare of the people. Now is the time to educate each other about the science behind climate change so that people don’t respond with hysteria (a behavior exhibiting overwhelming or unmanageable fear or emotional excess) about this issue. ‘Time is of the essence.’

Dick Needleman, M.D., M.P.H. is a retired orthopedic surgeon, member of Carolina Advocates for Climate, Health, and Equity, and health reporter for 103.3 Asheville FM

This article originally appeared on Asheville Citizen Times: Opinion: Open letter to Rep. Chuck Edwards about climate change