Climate Change and its Influence on Diseases and their Spreading. By: Haley Larson

What is the root cause of this issue and why is climate change occurring? Diseases such as bird flu, malaria, and yellow fever can be affected by temperature change in the climate. Temperature change can affect things like the growth and survival of an infectious agent. Intense rainfall and humidity are huge influences on causing diseases because they enhance mosquito breeding and their survival. Most diseases can worsen from climate change and also spread rapidly. Rainfall, for example, is one of the main causes of the spreading of diseases. Heavy rainfall and flooding can also increase water born diseases and contaminate fresh water sources. For example, heavy rainfall and flooding can overflow sewage treatment plants which then contaminate not only fresh water sources but also crops that many people rely on for food. Storm water runoff, also created by heavy rainfall, contaminates water bodies such as lakes and beaches that are used for recreational purposes. The most common disease caused by this is gastroenteritis which is inflammation of the stomach and intestine that causes vomiting, headaches and fever. Most food born diseases are created by heat waves. Since bacteria grows more rapidly in warm environments, salmonella and other food born diseases increase. Temperature change can also affect food security and threaten human life through malnutrition, infectious disease spreading and food poisoning. Climate change, also known as global warming, is occurring because the atmosphere has been trapping heat radiating from earth, which is also known as the greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect is an increase of water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, chlorofluorocarbons, and other gasses. Over the last 100 years, Earth’s average temperature has increased by 1.4F. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, a scientific body established by the United Nations that provide the most recent scientific, technical and socio-economic information, claims that in the 21st century the temperature will rise another 2 to 5.2F.

Where is this occurring and what is being done to handle the issue? Climate change is happening all over the world, not necessarily equally, but it is affecting us all in one way or another. Low-income and more vulnerable populations are most at risk. These are places such as India, who experiences periodic malaria epidemics, and Africa, which is the one of the most vulnerable continents to climate variability and change. Indigenous groups, or ethnic groups, all over the world such as Latin and South America, Europe, and Africa, are also experiencing threats from diseases caused by global climate change. Some ways we can if not stop, but slow down, global warming are to try and stop all of the greenhouses gasses that are being but into the air or attempt to take them out of the air (carbon sequestration). Carbon sequestration is a type of carbon dioxide removal. Here is a link to a video to simply describe the process of Carbon Sequestration Reflection – From researching this report I learned a lot more then I had knows about Global Warming. Not only is it just changing the climate but that change is affection things like disease and their spreading. I wish there was more we could do to help this situation but almost everyone I know is in denial about global warming and refuse to believe it is happening. There is a lot of evidence to support it but it just isn't enough to convince everyone to change their lifestyles. I like the idea of Carbon Sequestration and have never even heard of it before this report. I hope things get better in the future and people become more aware of this devastation that is occurring from destroying out planet.

Sources Cited Climate Change Leading to Diseases: WHO by Rahul Verma The Deadly Dozen: 12 Diseases Climate Change May Worsen adaptation/health.htmlhttp:// adaptation/health.html adaptation/international.htmlhttp:// adaptation/international.html nhttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_sequestratio n