Climate impacts have worsened vast range of human diseases - The Guardian

More than half of human diseases caused by pathogens have been aggravated by hazards associated with climate change, study finds.

More than half of the human diseases caused by pathogens have been worsened at some point by the sort of impacts associated with the climate crisis, a new and exhaustive study of the link between disease and climatic hazards has found.

Of the 375 different infectious diseases mentioned in these papers, the researchers found that 218, more than half, have been aggravated by climatic impacts now being made more common by global heating.

A smaller proportion of infectious diseases, about 16%, were diminished by climate impacts, according to the paper, published in Nature Climate Change.

The World Health Organization has warned that the climate crisis “threatens to undo the last 50 years of progress in development, global health, and poverty reduction” and has estimated that an additional 250,000 people will die each year from 2030 to 2050 due to proliferating diseases such as malaria and diarrhea, as well as malnutrition and heat stress.