UN Climate talks embrace first-ever 'Health Day' amidst urgent calls to tackle global warming's health impact
UN climate talks, there have been mounting concerns regarding the implications that global warming is having on people's health. The World Health Organization (WHO) underscores the urgency, citing extreme heat, air pollution, and the surge in deadly infectious diseases as critical threats to human well-being.
Central to the WHO's assertion is the necessity to cap global warming within the confines of the Paris Agreement, limiting the rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius.
This measure is deemed crucial to avert catastrophic health crises and prevent millions of climate-related fatalities. Alarming projections, however, unveiled by the UN, suggest an ominous trajectory with the world veering towards a 2.9-degree Celsius increase by the century's end.
While the repercussions of climate change will reverberate globally, specific demographics—children, women, the elderly, migrants, and those in less developed nations with lower greenhouse gas emissions—are deemed most susceptible.
A groundbreaking move is slated for the upcoming COP28 discussions in Dubai, earmarking December 3 as the inaugural "health day" within the climate negotiations.
Rising Threat of Extreme Heat
Amid forecasts predicting this year to potentially set a new record for heat, there's mounting concern over the amplified frequency and severity of heatwaves as global temperatures continue to soar. Recent studies revised upwards last year's European heat-related death toll to over 70,000, significantly higher than previously estimated.
According to findings from the Lancet Countdown report, individuals worldwide faced an average of 86 days exposed to life-threatening temperatures last year.
