The potential health impacts of climate variability and change for the United States: executive summary of the report of the health sector of the U.S. National Assessment.

Abstract

We examined the potential impacts of climate variability and change on human health as part of a congressionally mandated study of climate change in the United States. Our author team, comprising experts from academia, government, and the private sector, was selected by the federal interagency U.S. Global Change Research Program, and this report stems from our first 18 months of work. For this assessment we used a set of assumptions and/or projections of future climates developed for all participants in the National Assessment of the Potential Consequences of Climate Variability and Change. We identified five categories of health outcomes that are most likely to be affected by climate change because they are associated with weather and/or climate variables: temperature-related morbidity and mortality; health effects of extreme weather events (storms, tornadoes, hurricanes, and precipitation extremes); air-pollution-related health effects; water- and foodborne diseases; and vector- and rodent-borne diseases. We concluded that the levels of uncertainty preclude any definitive statement on the direction of potential future change for each of these health outcomes, although we developed some hypotheses. Although we mainly addressed adverse health outcomes, we identified some positive health outcomes, notably reduced cold-weather mortality, which has not been extensively examined. We found that at present most of the U.S. population is protected against adverse health outcomes associated with weather and/or climate, although certain demographic and geographic populations are at increased risk. We concluded that vigilance in the maintenance and improvement of public health systems and their responsiveness to changing climate conditions and to identified vulnerable subpopulations should help to protect the U.S. population from any adverse health outcomes of projected climate change.

Association between climate variability and malaria epidemics in the East African highlands

“…Thus, simultaneous analysis on the long-term time series of meteorological and parasitological data are critically needed to demonstrate the effects of climate on malaria cases. Moreover, climate variability (short-term fluctuations around the mean climate state on a fine time scale) may be epidemiologically more relevant than the mean temperature increase (31). However, the association between climate variability and malaria epidemics has not been rigorously examined.…”

Impact of climate change on waterborne diseases

“…There are several examples of waterborne diseases outbreaks associated to excessive rainfall [31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43]. The largest reported waterborne disease outbreak in the United States, due to the presence of Cryptosporidium cists in drinking water, occurred in Milwaukee in 1993 and was related to heavy rainfall and associated runoff and consequent contamination of Milwaukee lake, the source of the waterworks of the area.…”

Knowledge and awareness of heat-related morbidity among adult recreational endurance athletes

“…The trends varied when comparing the U.S. with northern Europe and South Africa. Four studies examined associations with emergency department (ED) and/or hospitalization-based measures in the U.S. One was in California on cardiovascular-related outcomes (Ebi et al 2004), two were general national assessments published in 2000 (Patz et al 2000, and one focused on the 2006 California heat wave (Knowlton et al 2009). Three other studies included an examination of ED and/or hospitalization in major industrialized citiesChicago (Semenza et al 1999), London (Kovats et al 2004), and Adelaide, Australia (Nitschke et al 2007).…”