On the first Friday of the conference, the U.S. Center sponsored a really insightful side event titled Climate Change and Health. The event provided a basic framework for understanding how climate change affects health and where this knowledge ought to direct us in the future. The way it stands now, health issues are rarely examined through the lens of climate change, as the scales on which these two issues are dealt with are so different: climate change is an incredibly slow process, whereas new health concerns and solutions prop up all the time. That being said, there are certainly health effects felt as a result of climate change, and an interdisciplinary framework through which to analyze these concerns is of the utmost importance.
So what are the health impacts of climate change exactly? Well, there are a lot. Climate change causes extreme weather events, which can create a host of health concerns: standing water following flooding events serve as ideal breeding grounds for disease-carrying insects as well as water borne diseases, such as diarrheal diseases and many other viral infections. Changes in climate alter insect life cycles, often increasing the infection period for malarial mosquitoes in sub-Saharan Africa. Poor air quality causes respiratory problems including asthma. Altering rain seasons, climate change also affects crop cycles, which can lead to famine.
Both the direct and cascading health effects from climate change are present and in urgent need of being addressed. Although the time frames for these two issues may appear to make them mutually irrelevant, the reality is that even a slow process like climate change can have major effects on health. What is needed to make progress in this field is interdisciplinary collaboration, both in research to understand the extend of the issues, and in implementation of solutions and mitigation efforts.
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