Climate Changes and Epidemiological Hotspots

Debleena Bhattacharya, V K Singh

• Publisher: CRC Press
• Year: 2022
• ISBN:
  9781000551488
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medicine
• Subtopic: Epidemiology

Climatic change plays an integral part in planetary health and is amongst the most important global environmental aspect that has an impact on human health. The linkage between the environmental change and disease dynamics has been highlighted in recent times and hence, emphasis on environmental sustainability to reduce future epidemics. Present book focusses on the relationship between climatic change and epidemiological factors with an approach to reduce the global hotspots. The climatic changes relevant to periods of activity and variations in geographical distribution is addressed including interconnection of sustainability, population growth and environmental change.

Features:

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• Covers environmental management and waste to resource for future.

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• Includes guidelines for analysis, assessment, and interventions for waste management.

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• Discusses environmental impediments in the way of healthcare inclusions.

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• Impresses upon the importance of clinical epidemiology to detect, treat, control, and prevent the spread of non-communicable diseases globally.

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• Provides insights for the future health hazards that can be administered at the insignificant stage.

This book aims at Graduate Students, Researchers, Professionals and Health Care Professionals in environmental engineering, waste management, climate change, and healthcare.

1Introduction

DOI: 10.1201/9781003120629-1

Why This Book?

The world is undergoing a troubled time when the very definition of safety has lost its eminence and we couldn’t find a proper direction to resolve the predicament. Our ever-increasing carbon footprint has impacted the environment around us. We are in need of a change for the situation that we have created.

It is the propensity of human beings to develop a problem and thereafter search for its solution. The observable effects of climate change will show its prominence in the near future.

In the Paris Climate Accord held in 2015, countries were committed to reducing their carbon output and halt global warming to 2 or 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century to reduce the impacts of climate change. According to the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) report, only 20% chances are there that in the next five years, it will be 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than the pre-industrial levels and will continuously increase with time.

Though the recent pandemic has impacted the environment and climate, the nature of carbon dioxide (CO₂) to live long in the atmosphere will not be impacted by the recent reduction of CO₂ atmospheric concentration due to global lockdown of industries.

According to the data of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), we need to find alternatives for our fossil fuel dependence by 2030 in order to prevent the global temperature rise to a threshold of 1.5 degrees Celsius, i.e. above pre-industrial levels. Premonitions are made by the experts that overcoming our threshold value will induce more heatwaves and hot summers, greater sea level rise, worst drought, heavy rainfall, wildfires, floods and eventually the food shortage of millions of people.

Due to the aggravation of the environment there is a risk of Force Majeure situation which can be construed by the series of epidemiological conundrums. This book specifically outlines the major environmental concerns that when monitored will conserve the sanctity of nature and prevent the harmful consequences foreseen in future.

What Is Climate Change?

Climate change is a detrimental factor for the evolution of earth from its earlier version. According to the Paris Climate Accord 2015, climate has rendered a lot of changes in the surrounding. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) suggested nine climatic tipping points that are connected both biologically and physically in complex ways, and if these happen the world will witness an irreversible change. The tipping points are the losses of the Amazon rainforest, Boreal forests, Permafrost, Arctic sea ice, Coral Reef, Atlantic circulation, Greenland ice sheets, Wilkes Basin Antarctica and west Antarctic ice sheets. The risk of natural calamities increases with the change in climate and the subsequent changes has increased the frequency of environmental concerns such as heatwaves, drought, floods and natural disasters like hurricanes, etc. Climate change will also have an impact on crop yield and increase in vector-borne diseases (Upadhyay et al., 2013).

What Are the Epidemiological Hotspots?

The environment is greatly hampered by constant changes occurring in the surroundings; therefore, in order to safeguard our health, we identify the hotspots.

Climate change has affected the health of people in various ways, i.e. through increased natural calamities where there is a frequency of heatwaves, floods, droughts and landslides. There are many diseases of significant public health disruptions, such as malaria and dengue, which are highly prone to change in climate (Patz and Kovats, 2002).

The burgeoning waste disposal before and presently amid the recent pandemic also acts as an ignition to the change in the environment. The waste in the form of both liquid and solid contributes to the dilapidation of the surroundings. The obnoxious gases and the harmful residuals emitted when these waste and wastewater are unattended for treatment lead to a toxic atmosphere. The accumulated waste is a nuisance to the living beings who dwells nearby it. The spread of contagion diseases is more rapid when they channelise through waste.

The increase in pollution due to expansion of cities and removal of vegetation will have detrimental impact on the environment because of global warming and this is very well foreseen by the impact on ozone layer. Ozone therefore has severe consequences for people with asthma (McConnell et al., 2002) as they are sensitive to these allergens and it promotes the development of asthma in children in their initial growing years (Koren and Bromberg, 1995; Koren and Utell, 1997).

This book enlightens about the various hotspots that remain unattended now will eventually find their significance in the long run.

Before the onset of the pandemic, the world has suffered the fury of nature for the last 49 years where 50% disasters occurred from weather, climate and water hazards, death toll were reported at 45% and 74% economic losses were incurred (World Meteorological Organization, 2021). These events remind us about our fragile inheritance and the need to conserve our environment.

Risk from flooding by the coastal storm is predicted to escalate from the present scenario of 75 million to 200 million of midrange climate changes, and the rise in the sea level is envisioned to reach to 40 cm by the 2080s (McCarthy et al., 2001).

The increase in seas might result in salination of coastal freshwater aquifers and also hamper the storm water drainage and sewage disposal therefore creating a situation where drinking water availability will be a concern (Patz, 2001).

The contaminated water will pave the path for communicable diseases (e.g. cholera or hepatitis A) and occurrence of disease outbreaks with flood waters (e.g. leptospirosis). Studies reported the epidemic of leptospirosis, a bacterial zoonosis that occurred after floods in Nicaragua and Brazil (Trevejo et al., 1998; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1995; Ko et al., 1999).

Another study showed that in Bangladesh in 1988, watery diarrhoea predominant in the population after floods was the most common factor for death of all age groups under 45, followed by respiratory infection (Siddique et al., 1991).

Frugal innovation in all the sectors will help us to accomplish the 17 sustainable development goals.

With the paradigm shift in climate, the food insecurity, risk of drought and lack of resources to import food will eventually increase the malnourishment in the population.

In a few years as projected (i.e. 2025), there will be an acceleration of 5 billion people who inhabit water-stressed countries.

Though technology has been a boon to the agriculture industry with improved crop varieties and irrigation system, the agricultural productivity backbone still lies in the climatic conditions. The change in environment will show its repercussions in the yield of crops (McMichael et al., 2001).

The other hotspots are the regions that experience weather extremes due to El-Nino weather patterns (Peru and Ecuador for floods, Southern Africa; Indonesia and Malaysia for droughts; Malaria in Punjab, India; and Cholera in Bangladesh) (Patz and Kovats, 2002).

This book will give a brief idea about the way the problem is perceived and the innovative way to resolve the same. The impact of climate change on our environment and surroundings is profound and our negligence eventually will pave the grave for us.

The recent pandemic gave us the outlook that even the most well-equipped and powerful nation has its own limitations and had to face the consequences of ignorance. The epidemiological hotspots when not addressed for a longer time will have a severe impact on the climate.

References

1. Upadhyay, N., Sun, Q., Allen, J.O., Westerhoff, P. and Herckes, P., 2013. Characterization of aerosol emissions from wastewater aeration basins. J Air Waste Manag Assoc, 63(1), 20–26.
2. Patz, J.A. and Kovats, R.S., 2002. Hotspots in climate change and human health. BMJ, 325(7372), 1094–1098.
3. Koren, H.S. and Bromberg, P.A., 1995. Respiratory responses of asthmatics to ozone. Int Arch Allergy Immunol, 107, 2368.
4. Koren, H.S. and Utell, M.J., 1997. Asthma and the environment. Environ Health Perspect,; 105, 5347.
5. McConnell, R., Berhane, K., Gilliland, F., London, S., Islam, T., Gauderman, W., et al., 2002. Asthma in exercising children exposed to ozone: a cohort study. Lancet, 359, 38691.
6. McCarthy, J., Canziani, O., Leary, N., Kokken, D. and White, K., 2001. Climate change 2001: impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability. New York: Cambridge University Press. (UN Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change. Third assessment report.)
7. Patz, J., 2001. Public health risk assessment linked to climatic and ecological change. Hum Ecolog Risk Assess, 7, 131727.
8. Trevejo, R.T., RigauPerez, J.G., Ashford, D.A., McClure, E.M., JarquinGonzalez, C., Amador, J.J., et al., 1998. Epidemic leptospirosis associated with pulmonary hemorrhage—Nicaragua, 1995. J Infect Dis, 178, 145763.
9. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1995. Outbreak of acute febrile illness and pulmonary hemorrhage—Nicaragua, 1995. Morb Mortal Wkly Rep MMWR; 44, 8413.
10. Ko, A.I., Galvao Reis, M., Ribeiro Dourado, C.M., Johnson, W.D. Jr and Riley, L.W., 1999. Urban epidemic of severe leptospirosis in Brazil. Salvador Lepto...