Climate change and human health

Soo-Jong Hong; Ju-Hee Seo

doi:10.5124/jkma.2011.54.2.149

J Korean Med Assoc > Volume 54(2); 2011 > Article

Hong and Seo: Climate change and human health

Focused Issue of This Month

Climate Change and Allergy

Journal of the Korean Medical Association

Journal of the Korean Medical Association 2011; 54(2): 149-155.

Published online: February 11, 2011

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5124/jkma.2011.54.2.149

Climate change and human health

Soo-Jong Hong, MD, Ju-Hee Seo, MD

Department of Pediatrics, Childhood Asthma Atopy Center, Asan Medical Center, University of Ulsan College of Medicine, Seoul, Korea.

Corresponding author: Soo-Jong Hong, sjhong@amc.seoul.kr

Received January 05, 2011 Accepted January 14, 2011

This is an Open-Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

Climactic changes, especially global warming, are potentially the largest global threat to human health and the source of the greatest number of cases of disease. If current emissions and land use trends continue unchecked, future generations will face more serious conditions, including injury, disease, and death related to natural disasters and heat waves, higher rates of climate-related infections, widespread malnutrition, and more allergy and air pollutionrelated morbidity and mortality. This review highlights the relationship between global climate changes and human health and provides some suggestions for improvement. According to the Fourth Assessment Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) published in 2007, global warming is caused by greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. The most important GHG is carbon dioxide (CO₂), which is released by the burning of fossil fuels and, to a lesser extent, by land use practices, followed by nitrous oxide and methane. IPCC predicts that global temperatures will rise 1.8℃-4.0℃ by 2099. According to the report, we can expect a significant rise in sea levels, massive species extinctions, changes in storm and drought cycles, altered ocean circulation, and redistribution of vegetation after crossing the "tipping point" of global warming. Human health will be adversely affected by the accelerating climate change. This review stimulates health care providers to provide quality care to susceptible individuals confronting new threats from climactic changes, as well as to work toward a mitigation of the drivers of climate change at the individual, community, and policy levels as part of a long-term commitment to protecting public health.

Climate change; Global warming; Health; Greenhouse gas; Protection

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Figure 1

Direction and magnitude of change of selected health impacts of climate change (From Parry ML, et al. Climate change 2007: impacts, adaptation and vulnerability. New York: Cambridge University Press; 2007. p. 418. Figure 8.3. Direction and magnitude of change of selected health impacts of climate change) [2].

Table 1

Potential range of effects of climate on vector-borne disease transmission

From McCarthy JJ, et al. Climate change 2001: impacts, adaptation, and vulnerability. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; 2001. p. 465. Table 9-2. Effect of climate factors on vector- and rodent-borne disease transmission [15].