Climate Change Could Cost 1 Million Lives A Year By 2030
Estimates brought to the table at UN talks on Friday state that climate change will indirectly cause nearly one million deaths annually by 2030, and will inflict 157 billion dollars in damage, with most of the misery being piled onto more than 50 of the world’s poorest countries.
Although most countries around the world will feel the devastating effects of climate change, none will pay as high an economic bill as the United States, the estimates suggest.
“In less than 20 years, almost all countries in the world will realize high vulnerability to climate impact as the planet heats up,” the report warned.
The report, compiled by a humanitarian research organization and climate-vulnerable countries, assessed how 184 nations will be affected in four main areas: health, weather and disasters, loss of human habitat, and economic stress.
Those facing the most critical exposure are 54 poor countries, including India. Those countries will suffer more excessively compared to others, but will also be the least to blame for the man-made greenhouse gases that drive climate change, the report said.
“Without corrective actions” a press release accompanying the study said, the world is “heading for nearly one million deaths every single year by 2030.”
More than half of the 157 billion dollars in economic losses will take place in industrialized countries, including the United States, Japan and Germany.
The report was issued by DARA, a Madrid-based NGO, and also by the Climate Vulnerable Forum, a group of island nations and other countries that are most exposed to climate change.
The findings spelled out the need to start shoring up defenses against climate change now, rather than later, said Saleemul Huq, a researcher at the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED).
“We are now entering into a highly vulnerable phase of our planet’s existence and humanity’s existence,” Huq told a press conference.
“No amount of (greenhouse-gas) mitigation will prevent at least another 0.7 degree (Celsius, 1.26 degrees Fahrenheit) of temperature rise over the next two decades,” he said.
“In the last century we have already seen a 0.7 degree (1.26 F) rise. So we are headed for 1.4 (2.5 F) almost certainly,” said Huq. “If emissions carry on their current pathway then we may in the longer term be headed for three or four degrees (5.4-7.2 F), which is practically impossible for everybody to adapt to.”
“But at the lower level, we can do a lot by adapting to the impacts of climate change, to prepare for them,” he added.
The Cancun summit, which lasts from Nov 29 to Dec 10, gathers 194 parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), tasked with reaching a deal to roll back global warming and its impacts after 2010.
The delegates will have to figure how they will raise funds to tackle climate change, and decide how much of the money should be allocated for adapting to the threat, and how much to reduce carbon emissions.
Previous studies into climate vulnerability have been more scarcely focused and have a longer timeframe, looking at, for instance, the risks by 2100.
By focusing on what will happen in the next few decades, the report has a better chance of swaying policymakers, as these events are likely to happen within their lifetime, said former UNFCCC chief Michael Zammit Cutajar.
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