CDC foresees health risks
because of climate change
Source: SF Chronicle, April 10, 2008
According to testimony from a top government health official, climate change is expected to have a significant impact on health in the next few decades, with certain regions of the country – as well as susceptible populations like children and seniors– most vulnerable to increased problems.
During testimony before the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming, Howard Frumkin, director of the CDC's National Center for Environmental Health, outlined a range of "major anticipated health" issues as a result of climate change. "Over the next few decades in the United States, climate change is likely to have a significant impact on health," declared Frumkin.
Among these risks are the prospects of more frequent heat waves that are of special danger to the elderly and the poor; increased incidents of extreme weather posing a
danger of drought in some areas and flooding in others; an increase of food-borne and waterborne infectious diseases; greater air pollution because of higher temperatures; and the migration into new areas of vector-borne and zoonotic diseases such as Lyme disease, West Nile virus, malaria or dengue fever as seasonal patterns change.
As the debate over global warming continues, the testimony given by the CDC, considered the government's premier disease tracking and monitoring agency, provided one of the strongest warnings by a government official. Yet Frumkin did not go as far as to offer an opinion as to whether greenhouse gases should be regulated as a danger to public health, a move that the EPA is currently considering.
The original article can be found on SFGate.com here:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/04/10/MNCO102JM3.DTL