Study: Climate change threatens health in Europe
Agneta Elmegård
Updated 18.26 | Published 11.16
Climate change threatens the health of Europeans. That's what a new report shows. Heat-related morbidity and mortality from exposure to air pollution, an increased exposure to extreme weather and climate events, and an increased risk of contracting infectious diseases, are just some of the effects, the report shows; ”Lancet Countdown on Climate change and health”.
Europe is the continent that is warming the fastest according to several different studies. Now the consequences of this are described in a en report released today, ”Lancet Countdown on Climate change and health”. The report describes major, already existing health effects in Europe through heat-related morbidity and resulting deaths. The report on how the climate affects the health of Europeans is the second indicator report from the Lancet Countdown, which follows trends in health and climate change in Europe. It is an interdisciplinary collaboration between 69 researchers and which follows the development with the help of more than 40 indicators, spanning 42 institutions within science and the UN. Umeå university is alone in Sweden in participating in the work, with researchers working at the Department of Epidemiology and Global Health and the Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine.
- The trends show a Southern Europe that is more affected by forest fires, food insecurity, drought, mosquito- and tick-borne diseases, infectious diseases caused by viruses, bacteria and parasites. In northern Europe, for example, there are reports of increased risks from Vibrio, which can cause bathing fever, and ticks that spread diseases such as Lyme disease and TBE, says Professor Jan Semenza, one of the researchers who worked on the report at Umeå University, in a press release.
The report reveals a lack of measures to protect citizens from the effects of climate change. Many European countries have large emissions of greenhouse gases and still give net subsidies to fossil fuels - despite knowledge of how it harms people's health.
The time when people were exposed to heat waves was 1.28 billion person-days during the period 2012–2021, which can be compared with 650 million person-days for the period 2000–2009. This is a relative increase of 97 percent.
- Heat-related deaths are estimated to have increased in most of Europe. The risk is particularly great for, for example, the elderly and people suffering from a chronic disease, comments Maria Nilsson, chairperson of Lancet Countdown in Europe and member of Lancet Countdown's global steering group, at the Department of Epidemiology and Global Health at Umeå University.
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Extreme weather
This is how Europe's cities prepare for extreme weather
Sofia Eriksson/TT
Updated 2024-05-07 12.10 | Published 2024-05-05 10.50
Showy parks, urban forests and green roofs.
It is among the most common solutions when Europe's cities are equipped to withstand climate effects such as heat waves and floods, according to a new report.
Europe must become better at adapting to the effects of climate change, according to the EU's environmental agency EEA, which recently warned that extreme heat, drought, forest fires and floods will worsen and negatively affect living conditions.
The climate effects may be particularly felt in densely built-up urban areas, according to a new report from the EEA that looked more closely at how European cities are being equipped to stand up to more frequent and intense extreme weather in the future.
It turned out that almost everyone is increasingly using nature-based solutions for improved resilience.
Natural solutions
Of the 19,000 local climate action plans analyzed, 91 percent contained nature-based methods such as the construction and maintenance of parks, urban forests and green roofs. Greenery can help cool cities and manage water - but also has other benefits, such as places for recreation or reducing air pollution, the EEA emphasizes.
But relying on nature-based tools is unlikely to be enough, the EEA warns. The climate effects are expected to grow to a size that requires a combination of different measures, including changes in the physical infrastructure.
Long-termism from a political point of view, often linked financing, but also involvement of the local population are highlighted as some of the building blocks for successful climate adaptation.
- Capitals and large cities are usually forerunners because they have great financial and technical capacity to work on adaptation, and can even be more ambitious than the national level when it comes to climate action, says Ine Vandecasteele, climate adaptation expert at the EEA, to Euronews .
- But it is not only larger cities that take good initiatives.
Embrace the rain
One city that stands out is Madrid, where over the next ten years they want to plant two million trees in a ring around the city.
Another project that is highlighted in the report is how Gothenburg has adapted to the fact that it already rains on average about every three days - and there will be more as a result of climate change.
Instead of hanging on, Gothenburg has decided to embrace the rain and become an "international role model as a rainy city". EEA notes, among other things, that playgrounds are built to invite creative play even when it pours down from the sky.
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Sumatra
Death toll rises in flooded Sumatra
TT-AP-AFP
Updated 14.48 | Published 07.46
The number of confirmed deaths is rising after torrential rains and landslides hit the Indonesian island of Sumatra this weekend.
So far, 44 people have been found dead, according to data from the country's disaster authority BNPB. A further 15 people are missing.
Among other things, the rain fell on an active volcano in the area, sending rocks and solidified masses of lava tumbling towards communities below.
- I heard the roar and a sound that reminded me of boiling water. It was the sound of large rocks collapsing, said housewife Rina Devina, who told AFP that three of her neighbors had died.
The rainy season in Indonesia, which is often fraught with problems, usually falls between October and March. In March, 26 people died in landslides and floods in West Sumatra. In 2022, about 24,000 people were forced to evacuate and two children died in floods on the same island. Environmentalists have blamed logging for exacerbating the problems.
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