In a powerful presentation on the state of climate science to the Caribbean, Professor Michael Taylor from UWI Jamaica highlighted three action items – Acknowledge climate change as a present concern, Contemplate climate change as a growing concern, and Tackle climate change as an urgent concern. The Caribbean depends on a stable and familiar climate for its development and quality of life. When climate change introduces unfamiliar patterns, as it has done, we see profound impacts on the economy, tourism, agriculture, fisheries, energy systems, water supplies, and health.
He pointed out that we must acknowledge that we are already experiencing hotter, drier weather overall, with more monster storms, inundations of rain, and rising seas. But, he said, we must contemplate that we are facing in the future even hotter and drier times, even higher sea levels that will erode our beaches and tourism, and even more extreme weather events. The ‘unprecedented’ will be increasingly the norm, and this has profound social, economic, environmental, and health implications for a region where most people live on the coast.
The impacts on health are many and varied, from direct effects of heat-related illness, death, and heart failure; to injuries fatalities, and mental health impacts from hurricanes; to increased allergies and asthma, to more water borne diseases, to more vector-borne infections like dengue fever and Chikungunya as mosquitoes multiply faster. Beyond that, climate change is affecting determinants of health, such as water quality and food availability, as well as access to health services and facilities. The health sector will be stressed and will find it increasingly difficult to deliver healthcare.
Dr. Taylor pointed to how climate change is not ‘something for the future’; it is already affecting our electricity bills, insurance premiums for flooding and storm damage, and availability and prices of safe and nutritious food; these effects will be felt most by the most vulnerable in our societies: the poor, those with disabilities, youth and elderly.
While all countries are or will be affected, some are at particular risk because of location in Hurricane alley such as the Eastern Caribbean countries, or low lying such as Guyana, Suriname, Belize; the Bahamas, and the Turks and Caicos Islands. He pointed to the receding shoreline in Jamaica’s famous Negril beach as sea levels rise at an increasing rate and to Dominica’s and Puerto Rico’s massive losses from Hurricane Maria.
Dr. Taylor closed by emphasizing that we need to tackle climate change as an urgent concern. We need to develop a strong adaption program to face our new climate reality, combined with a strong mitigation agenda to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the Caribbean, including in the healthcare sector, while advocating as strongly as possible at global levels for the main contributors to greenhouse gas emissions to rapidly reduce the continuing use of fossil fuels, which is destroying our future and our children’s future.
With over 1100 registrants from over 20 countries, the conference continues Thursday through Friday with an in-depth look at the immediate health benefits of climate action, the role of the health sector in addressing climate change, and the way forward. You can register here for free: https://cvent.me/rqlPro
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EarthMedic and EarthNurse are not-for-profits launched in July 2020 with global scope, and special focus on climate-vulnerable regions, anchored in the Caribbean small island developing states (SIDS), and based in Trinidad and Tobago and England, UK. EarthMedic and EarthNurse are focused on health and environment-related concerns, with the goal of being a home for nurses, doctors and others, concerned about the climate and health emergency we face, where we can safely discuss our concerns, make connections and share ideas and resources, as well as take action to improve health of self, society and planet. For more information about the EarthMedic and EarthNurse, please visit our website at www.earthmedic.com
