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The news from the The Health and Security Perspectives of Climate Change conference is grim. A group of scientists, environmental health experts and government officials at the conference have all issued a warning that climate change is going to be ‘catastrophic’ to global health and could cause global instability.
A statement released by the group warns that dealing with climate change will further burden the world’s militaries and have ‘enormous’ human and economic costs. These include more frequent extreme weather events, water and food shortages, the spread of diseases, potential ecosystem collapse and threats to livelihoods.
Anthony Costello, a global health expert at University College London, argued that the most pressing impact of climate change is crop shortages and resulting increases in food prices.
The BBC’s coverage goes further and looks at countries at risk and possible trade patterns, with potential conflicts affecting global supplies of everything from energy to coffee.
The sad thing is that a significant percentage of people will continue to deny the clear evidence of climate change and the clear effects it will have on global economies if not health. Right now we don’t need short-sighted policies that will ignore these kinds of pressures on our economy and health while still failing to directly tackle these problems here in the US.