One of the world's most respected medical journals, The Lancet, is the latest to sound the alarm over global warming, compiling evidence that as the climate changes there will be dramatically increased human casualties from heatwaves, food shortages, water scarcity, and diseases like malaria and skin cancer.
Thus, they conclude that climate change is the "biggest global health threat of the 21st century."
Recognizing that the medical community is coming a bit late to the game, Dr Richard Horton, editor of The Lancet, acknowledged that "doctors have been in denial over climate change and need a wake-up call."
Most of this is not new news really. But there is a silver lining. Professor Mark Maslin, director of University College London Environment Institute says here that we can save billions in health care costs and countless lives by quickly cutting our carbon footprint:
"If we redesign our cities so people walk more, cycle more, use public transport, suddenly we drop the incidence of obesity, heart disease, strokes and stress-related illness. So what we can see is that there are huge amounts of win-win solutions. If we lower the carbon emissions of our cities, we increase our health."Truly does sound like a win-win prescription. Now we just need to get our politicians to swallow the same medicine.
