The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the most authorative body regarding climate change issue, has provided overwhelming evidence that the world is getting warmer, and that human activity is primarily responsible. Burning fossil fuels, like oil and coal, and the changing use of land, including the destruction of forests, have increased the atmospheric concentration of ‘greenhouse gases’ (mainly carbon dioxide).
Temperatures are already set to rise by one degree celsius over the next few decades. If the world does not act now to curb emissions, average global temperatures in 2100 could be between 1.4 and 5.8 degrees higher than they were in 1990.
The greatest impact of the rising temperatures will be on the water cycle, which is a vital part of our whole climate system. The IPCC forecasts that greater variations in rainfall, combined with rising sea levels and higher sea temperatures, are likely to lead to more frequent and more extreme weather events – such as storms, floods and droughts. Agriculture and food production will be immediately affected with increasing rates of malnutrition due to drought conditions. Health effects of climate change will represent one of the biggest challenges world-wide for population health in the nearest future. The World Health Organization has already estimated 150.000 deaths annually due to climate change.
Developing countries and the poor populations within all countries are the ones who will suffer more the impacts of climate change, thereby exacerbating inequities in health status and access to adequate food, clean water and other resources in the nearer future.
The objectives of this topic are:
- To introduce global environmental change and its potential impacts
- To analyse the current international response to climate change
- To discuss the different policy options that particularly low-income countries might have
Presentation
Very huge file. Email coordinator. Watch this space.
Pre-reading
Hallstrom Niklas. The environmental crisis threat to health and ways forward. Background paper for the First People´s Health Movement Assembly, Bangladesh 2000. Download here
McMichael AJ, Beaglehole R. The changing global context of public health. Lancet 2000; 356: 495-9.
McMichael AJ, Woodruff RE, Hales S. Climate change and human health: present and future risks. Lancet 2006; 367(9513): 859-69.
People´s Health Movement, Medact, Global Equity Gauge Alliance. The wider health context: Climate change. In Global Health Watch. Zed Books Ltd: London, 2005. pp: 193-206. Download here
Stephens C, Bullock S, Scott A. Environmental justice Rights and means to a healthy environment for all. ESRC Global Environmental Change Programme, 2001.
Useful websites
http://www.grida.no/climate/vital
http://www.un.org/climatechange/
http://www.who.int/globalchange/climate/en/
http://www.oxfam.org.uk/resources/policy/climate_change/index.html
http://www.foe.co.uk/campaigns/climate/issues/climate_change/
http://www.cseindia.org/html/eyou/climate/index_climate.htm
http://www.christianaid.org.uk/stoppoverty/climatechange/index.aspx
http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/climate-change
Further reading
Lohmann L. Carbon trading. A critical conversation on climate change, privatization and power. Available at: http://www.dhf.uu.se/seminars/12_march_2007.html
McMichael AJ. Planetary overload. Cambridge University Press, 1993
McMichael AJ. Human frontiers, environments and disease. Cambridge University Press, 2001.
Climate Change and Human Health: risk and responses. WHO, UNEP, WMO, 2003. Available at: http://www.who.int/globalchange/publications/cchhsummary/en/
United Nations Development Programme. Human development 2007/2008 Report. Fighting climate change: Human solidarity in a divided world. Available at: http://hdr.undp.org/
Discussion questions
What are the important environmental problems that affect you locally?
Are you affected, directly, or indirectly, by global environmental problems?
In what ways do these problems affect people’s health?
How does climate change affect my country now and in the future?
Which policies or measures should my country implement?
How can I contribute to the implementation of those measures?
How can environment and health activists work more closely together?
Assignment topics
Identify which is the position of your country regarding climate change policies.
Identify which actions, plans has your country been implementing to combat climate change.
Identify groups or stories from your country that are working this issue
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