[✔️] April 12, 2024 Global Warming News | Heat&Stroke, Heat&disease, Heat records, Heat Loons, $830 million, 2018 Politico

[Richard Pauli]

/*April *//*12, 2024*/

/[ United Press International -- human health ]/
*Extreme weather associated with increase in stroke deaths*
By Dennis Thompson, HealthDay News
APRIL 11, 2024
Intense weather fluctuations caused by climate change could be 
contributing to an increase in stroke deaths, a new study claims.

Freezing cold fronts and broiling heat waves are associated with more 
than half a million deaths annually in recent years, researchers report 
Wednesday in the journal Neurology.
"Dramatic temperature changes in recent years have affected human health 
and caused widespread concern," said researcher Quan Cheng, of Xiangya 
Hospital at Central South University in Changsha, China.

"Our study found that these changing temperatures may increase the 
burden of stroke worldwide, especially in older populations and areas 
with more healthcare disparities," Cheng added in a journal news release.
Bone-chilling cold fronts in particular were linked to more strokes, 
researchers said.
But temperatures that swing too high or too low can both increase a 
person's risk of stroke, researchers added in background notes.

Lower temperatures cause a person's blood vessels to constrict, 
increasing blood pressure. High blood pressure is a primary risk factor 
for stroke.

On the other hand, higher temperatures can cause dehydration, which 
thickens and slows blood -- factors also associated with stroke.

Stroke deaths in the United States increased 26% between 2011 and 2021, 
according to the American Heart Association. Some of this could be tied 
to climate change, the researchers argue.
For the study, the team looked at three decades of health records for 
more than 200 countries and territories, comparing stroke deaths to the 
local temperature at the time.

There were more than 521,000 stroke deaths in 2019 linked to 
temperatures that swung too low or too high, researchers estimate.

Cold fronts were linked to more than 474,000 of those deaths, results show.

That's a hefty chunk of the 6.6 million total deaths worldwide 
attributable to stroke in 2019, according to the American Heart Association.

The stroke death rate linked to temperature changes were 7.7 deaths per 
100,000 people for men and 5.9 per 100,000 for women, researchers said.

Central Asia was the region with the highest temperature-associated 
stroke death rate, at 18 per 100,000.

"More research is needed to determine the impact of temperature change 
on stroke and to target solutions to address health inequalities," Cheng 
said. "Future research should aim to reduce this threat by finding 
effective health policies that address potential causes of climate 
change, such as the burning of fossil fuels, deforestation and 
industrial processes."
https://www.upi.com/Health_News/2024/04/11/climate-change-stroke-deaths/8621712840332/



/[  heat means more disease ]/
*Sick, hot world: Climate change favors disease vectors, threatening to 
unleash more pandemics*
Ticks, mosquitos, viruses and fungi all thrive as we cook the planet. 
Here's how we can stop their spread
By MATTHEW ROZSA
APRIL 11, 2024
Global heating has so profoundly altered our planet that some experts 
argue it's no longer about a changing climate and instead about a 
changed climate. In other words, the hotter, more chaotic world 
predicted by climate scientists is part of our present, not just our 
future. And those changes extend beyond rising sea levels and heat waves 
to how diseases spread and impact society.

For example, climate change is a breeding ground for intensified cholera 
outbreaks — one of only many diseases that could become full-fledged 
pandemics as humans continue to overheat the planet by burning fossil fuels.

Cholera patients experience many symptoms, ranging from unpleasant to 
deadly. Once a mosquito bite transmits a dangerous Vibrio cholerae 
strain like O1 and O139 to a human, that person will experience painful 
leg cramps, insatiable thirst and constant nausea punctuated by 
vomiting. An infected individual usually feels restless and spends a lot 
of time defecating watery diarrhea. Even healthy adults will die within 
a few hours if they do not get the correct treatment, with hundreds of 
thousands suffering that fate every year...
This is in spite of the fact that, as the Harvard Global Health 
Institute's faculty director Dr. Louise Ivers said, the disease is 
"completely preventable and also treatable."

Unsanitary and deadly: The Great Stink of 1858 may foreshadow our future 
climate breakdown
Cholera is a particularly horrible consequence of this trend, generally 
afflicting those least responsible for global warming, given that 
Western nations disproportionately release the most carbon emissions.
"Typically the people who are affected by cholera are impoverished, 
distant from medical care, underserved communities — those without 
access to clean water and sanitation are the most vulnerable," Ivers 
said. "Those with food insecurity also have a disproportionate risk of 
death."
Given that cholera disproportionately impacts marginalized communities, 
it is perhaps unsurprising that Ivers (who works directly to address the 
Haitian outbreaks) described it as an "underreported pandemic." It has 
been circulating since the 1960s, and in Haiti alone it took 10,000 
lives while impacting almost 1 million others from 2010 to 2018. The 
outbreak returned a few years later. Global heating is only making 
things wors
"Climate change is important for cholera in that extreme weather events 
can cause displacement of people and also disruption of their safe water 
supplies through flooding, putting pressure on water sources making 
people vulnerable to pathogens in the water, effectively this is 
increasing the dispersal of pathogens," Ivers said. "We see routinely 
that cholera peaks in Haiti during seasons when rainfall is highest. We 
see that some Vibrios are very susceptible to environmental temperatures 
and the impact of that directly on Vibrio cholerae is being studied."
Ivers added, "As a doctor, my team and I have cared for thousands of 
patients with cholera over the years. It is a dramatic and painful death 
– and totally unnecessary."

Other pathogens are also likely to benefit from global heating. Dr. Ben 
Beard, deputy director of the Division of Vector-Borne Diseases at the 
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), said that climate 
change will create a number of conditions conducive to dangerous 
pathogens: Longer and warmer summers, shorter and milder winters and 
increasingly frequent/unusually severe extreme weather events (such as 
heat waves, storms and droughts).

All of these climate alterations can cultivate pathogens like viruses, 
bacteria, fungi and parasites by helping them spread and multiply more 
quickly, widening their geographical distribution and influencing 
behaviors such as when they feed and their preferred choice of host.
Beard noted that the geographic distribution for mosquito and tick 
vectors is already expanding, including blacklegged ticks (Ixodes 
scapularis) responsible for Lyme disase or yellow fever mosquitos (Aedes 
aegypti) that don't just carry their namesake illness but also dengue, 
Zika and Chikungunya.
"As environmental conditions change, it is likely that certain diseases 
will appear in areas where they previously had not occurred," Beard 
said. "Likewise, we might expect that some diseases may become less 
common in places where they had been of great importance."

In the case of tick-borne diseases, for example, Beard noted that the 
geographic ranges have already expanded in recent years for ticks that 
spread Lyme, anaplasmosis, ehrlichiosis and spotted fever rickettsiosis.

"While the exact reasons for the geographic spread of ticks and the 
diseases they carry are unclear, a number of factors may contribute," 
Beard said, such as how "the spread of Lyme disease over the past 
several decades has been linked to changes in land use patterns, 
including reforestation in the northeastern United States."

For example, suburban developments that attempt to shove civilization 
into recently wild areas put humans in close contact with tick hosts 
like mice and chipmunks. It is hardly unusual in the modern era for 
human activity to inadvertently cause pathogen-carrying animals to more 
closely interact with our own species. Climate change is just one more 
example of that happening.
Ivers referred Salon to a pair of papers from the journal Nature, both 
of which illuminate the growing threat of a climate change-induced 
pandemic. In a 2022 paper titled "Climate change increases cross-species 
viral transmission risk," they projected how 3,139 mammal species will 
shift their geographical ranges by 2070 due to climate change and human 
use of wild land, with their study including a number of possible 
outcomes. The authors anticipate that species will repopulate at higher 
elevations while interacting with each other in new ways, as well as 
entering so-called "biodiversity hotspots" with lots of various 
organisms. Inevitably this will bring them into highly populated areas, 
particularly in Asia and Africa, "causing the cross-species transmission 
of their associated viruses an estimated 4,000 times."

The other 2022 paper by Nature, titled "Over half of known human 
pathogenic diseases can be aggravated by climate change," involved 
scientists investigating empirical examples of how each known human 
pathogenic disease responds to ten different types of climatic hazards 
sensitive to greenhouse gas emissions.

"We found that 58% (that is, 218 out of 375) of infectious diseases 
confronted by humanity worldwide have been at some point aggravated by 
climatic hazards," the authors wrote. "16% were at times diminished."
If there is any good news, it is that the problem of addressing 
pandemics caused by climate change can be solved. It will simply require 
the same kind of concerted, science-informed human activity that got our 
species into this mess in the first place.

"Addressing the continuing and increasing threat of diseases spread by 
mosquitoes, ticks and other vectors requires a multi-faceted approach at 
federal, territorial, state and local levels," Beard said. "To prepare 
for, prevent and respond to this growing threat, human and ecological 
surveillance and research need to be expanded; state, local and federal 
capacity enhanced; safe and effective prevention tools validated for 
use; and public and health care provider awareness increased."

Beard added, "Everyone can play a role in helping prevent themselves and 
their loved ones from vector-borne diseases by preventing mosquito bites 
by wearing EPA-registered insect repellents and taking other prevention 
steps."

In addition to treating the vectors of these diseases directly, Ivers 
also urged people to tackle two of the roots of the problem — humanity's 
overuse of fossil fuels and the consequent climate change and systemic 
social inequalities.

"Our generation has an important role to play in mitigating climate 
change — and that includes the healthcare industry which is responsible 
for 8.5% of the US’ greenhouse gas emissions — and adapting," Ivers 
said. "We should be building the health systems that we need to respond 
not just to pandemics but also to the most basic health needs of the 
global population. In some ways the call to action around climate change 
is an opportunity to truly transform health systems to meet the needs of 
people now and in the future."
https://www.salon.com/2024/04/11/sick-hot-world-climate-change-favors-disease-vectors-threatening-to-unleash-more/



/[  NYTimes  ]/
*Ocean Heat Has Shattered Records for More Than a Year. What’s Happening?*
There have been record temperatures every day for more than a year. 
Scientists are investigating what’s behind the extraordinary measurements.
The ocean has now broken temperature records every day for more than a 
year. And so far, 2024 has continued 2023’s trend of beating previous 
records by wide margins. In fact, the whole planet has been hot for 
months, according to many different data sets.

“There’s no ambiguity about the data,” said Gavin Schmidt, a 
climatologist and the director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space 
Studies. “So really, it’s a question of attribution.”

Understanding what specific physical processes are behind these 
temperature records will help scientists improve their climate models 
and better predict temperatures in the future.

Last month, the average global sea surface temperature reached a new 
monthly high of 21.07 degrees Celsius, or 69.93 degrees Fahrenheit, 
according to the Copernicus Climate Change Service, a research 
institution funded by the European Union.
“March 2024 continues the sequence of climate records toppling for both 
air temperature and ocean surface temperatures,” Samantha Burgess, 
deputy director of Copernicus, said in a statement this week...
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/10/climate/ocean-heat-records.html/
/


/[  Crazy as a Loon ]/
*Climate change threatens loon population, new study shows*
Increased rainfall and decline in water clarity hurts loon reproductive 
success.
Gaby Vinick
April 10, 2024,
Famous for their nocturnal calls, loons are aquatic birds often 
described as icons of the Northwoods. But new research shows climate 
change impairs their ability to feed their young.

A climate-induced decrease in water clarity could be a cause for the 
loon population decline in Wisconsin and more broadly across the 
northern United States, according to a new report from the academic 
journal Ecology.

Researchers used satellite imagery to study water clarity in 127 lakes 
across northern Wisconsin from 1995 to 2021. Increased rainfall in July 
each year reduced water clarity in loon territories. Over that time 
period, water clarity fell by about 16%, and chicks lost about 10% of 
their weight. Adult loons have also dropped weight each year since 1995.

The findings suggest that a decline in water clarity hurts loon 
reproductive success. Since loons are visual predators, they depend on 
high water clarity to hunt fish underwater and feed their chicks. With a 
reduced diet, chicks have lower survival rates.

Walter Piper, the lead author of the study and a biology professor at 
Chapman University, said that loon chick mass is an indication of how 
healthy, well-fed and likely chicks are to survive.
"Over the last 25 years, what we noticed is that you get a lot more 
unhealthy chicks that are below the weight that they should be for their 
age," Piper said. "More of them are dying."

The Northland College’s Wisconsin Loon Population Survey, conducted 
every five years, shows that despite successful recovery efforts, 2020 
marked the beginning of a new population downturn. The adult population 
fell by 5% from 2015.

That decline signaled what Piper called the beginning of a new downturn 
associated with water clarity decline. He said there is a five to 
10-year lag between the time when breeding problems hit a population and 
when those problems start to be felt in the adult territorial population.

"It’s becoming clear that climate change is a real danger to loons, when 
we hadn’t really known that before," Piper said.

Loons typically nest between May and June. Piper said the summer months, 
especially July, are critical to a successful reproductive season 
because chicks are completely dependent on their parents and cannot fly yet.
The researchers presume it’s likely that the decline in water clarity 
can be attributed to heavy rainfall flushing in bits of material from 
plants and animals, including fertilizer or pet waste.

There are other climate threats to the loon population. Experts like 
John Cooley, a senior biologist with the Loon Preservation Committee in 
New Hampshire, have seen the parasite avian malaria emerge as a source 
of mortality for loons in the last decade.
An ongoing recovery is underway in New Hampshire through restoration 
efforts, but Cooley said the birds remain vulnerable to climate change 
because warmer temperatures compromise nest success and more heavy 
rainfall events cause nest flooding.

"We’re seeing mortality in the wintertime on the freshwater lakes when 
loons stay too long because the ice hasn’t formed the way it used to," 
Cooley said. "We get a warm winter, the loons stick around, and then 
they’re trapped when the ice does eventually form."

Loons are at the top of the aquatic food chain, making them an important 
species to understanding water quality. They serve as a sentinel for 
identifying contaminants in freshwaters.
Like Cooley, Piper worries the population will shift out of the U.S. to 
more suitable climates in the north.

"It would be devastating to folks in the northern U.S. if loons 
disappeared," Piper said. "This is a charismatic species of enormous 
importance."

With more frequent rainfall, the black fly season has lengthened in some 
parts of the country. Black flies, which are biting insects, swarm loons 
as they try to incubate their eggs and drive them off their nest, Piper 
said.

"It’s kind of a one-two punch of climate change and overall that has 
just meant that they are not fledging as many chicks, not producing as 
many chicks that reach adulthood as they used to," Piper said.

The researchers plan to expand their study to other regions where loons 
breed to better understand threats to their population. That includes 
Minnesota, where loons are the state bird.
Cooley of the Loon Preservation Committee said there are steps that 
should be taken now to protect the birds and lakes.

"It’s not too late. Even these familiar iconic species like loons that 
we all love, we are starting to see real impacts in this natural 
system," Cooley said.
https://abcnews.go.com/General/climate-change-threatens-loon-population-new-study-shows/story?id=109092273


/[ money well spent ]/
*Biden Awards $830 Million To Ready Nation For Climate Change*
By Associated Press
4-11-24
The Biden administration on Thursday awarded $830 million in grants to 
fund 80 projects aimed at toughening the nation's aging infrastructure 
against the harmful impacts of climate change.

The money is expected to improve bridges, roads, ports, rail, transit 
and other infrastructure across 37 states, Washington, D.C. and the 
Virgin Islands, particularly those battered by increasingly frequent 
extreme weather events brought on by the planet's warming.

The funds come from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law passed in 2021 and 
add to other funding already flowing to states for similar projects, 
according to the U.S. Department of Transportation.

It's the latest of many federal efforts to address the negative effects 
of human-caused climate change. President Joe Biden has earmarked more 
than $50 billion toward climate-related projects through the 
infrastructure law and the Inflation Reduction Act. He has emphasized 
the importance of climate resilience and adaptation as he seeks a second 
term.

“We have seen far too many examples of transportation infrastructure 
being shut down or damaged by extreme weather, which is more extreme and 
more frequent in this time of climate change,” Secretary of 
Transportation Pete Buttigieg said in a call with reporters ahead of the 
announcement. “America’s infrastructure was not built for the climate 
that we have today, and the consequences of this are very real and being 
felt by people in every part of the country."

He cited events such as the California wildfires, affecting rail in the 
state, and flooding in New York City, hamstringing the city's critical 
subway system. Incidents such as this are worsening, as is global heat; 
March set a new monthly record for the 10th consecutive month.

"Not only is this timely, not only is this responsive to the science, 
not only is this critical, to the communities that will benefit, it’s a 
very high return on investment for public dollars,” National Climate 
Advisor Ali Zaidi said.
Among the funding recipients are:

    —Golden, Colorado will receive $23.8 million to control flooding in
    Lena Gulch.

    —Cedar Rapids, Iowa will receive $56.4 million to replace the
    86-year-old Arc of Justice Bridge, crucial for emergency services in
    times of extreme flooding.

    —Kalamazoo, Michigan will receive nearly $38 million to upgrade
    stormwater infrastructure.

    —The Rhode Island Department of Transportation will receive $750,000
    for a coastal management plan.

    —The Oglala Sioux Tribe will receive $248,000 for a risk assessment
    of its transportation infrastructure.

The grants each take one of four forms.

Planning grants totaling $45 million will be issued for 26 projects. 
Resilience improvement funds, totaling $621 million, will be granted to 
36 recipients for enhancing projects such as drainage, roadways and 
other upgrades. Ten projects will receive a total of $45 million in 
community resilience and evacuation grants, and eight projects will 
share $119 million in coastal infrastructure funding.
https://weather.com/news/climate/news/2024-04-11-biden-awards-millions-to-strengthen-infrastructure-climate-change



/[The news archive -  ]/
/*April 12, 2018*/
April 12, 2018:
Politico.com reports:

    “A former top EPA staffer has told Democratic lawmakers that the
    agency fired him after he refused to retroactively approve the
    first-class travel of one of Administrator Scott Pruitt's closest
    aides, according to letters made public Thursday.

    “The dismissed political appointee, Kevin Chmielewski, also alleged
    that Pruitt flouted price limits on hotel stays and office decor,
    put an aide to work house-hunting for him, arranged taxpayer-funded
    trips to his native Oklahoma and other destinations just because he
    wanted to travel there and lied last week when he denied knowing
    about backdoor raises the agency had granted to two of his top
    aides, the lawmakers said Thursday in a letter to the agency.

    “In addition, Chmielewski detailed allegations of lavish spending on
    Pruitt's personal security and a possible conflict of interest
    involving his top bodyguard, as well a $100,000-per-month private
    jet rental that he says EPA looked into at Pruitt's direction. He
    also said, as POLITICO reported last week, that Pruitt was
    frequently late in paying the $50-a-night rent on his lobbyist-owned
    Capitol Hill condo last year.

    “The lawmakers, including Sens. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Sheldon
    Whitehouse (D-R.I.), separately wrote to President Donald Trump and
    urged him to rethink his public support for the embattled EPA chief.”

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/12/former-epa-staffer-pruitt-first-class-478291 
e-issue/




/Archive of Daily Global Warming News 
https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/

/To receive daily mailings - click to Subscribe 
<mailto:subscribe at theClimate.Vote?subject=Click%20SEND%20to%20process%20your%20request> 
to news digest./

/Archive of Daily Global Warming News 
https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/

Privacy and Security: *This mailing is text-only -- and carries no 
images or attachments which may originate from remote servers. Text-only 
messages provide greater privacy to the receiver and sender. This is a 
personal hobby production curated by Richard Pauli
By regulation, the .VOTE top-level domain cannot be used for commercial 
purposes. Messages have no tracking software.
To subscribe, email: contact at theclimate.vote 
<mailto:contact at theclimate.vote> with subject subscribe, To Unsubscribe, 
subject: unsubscribe
Also you may subscribe/unsubscribe at 
https://pairlist10.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/theclimate.vote

Links and headlines assembled and curated by Richard Pauli for 
http://TheClimate.Vote <http://TheClimate.Vote/> delivering succinct 
information for citizens and responsible governments of all levels. List 
membership is confidential and records are scrupulously restricted to 
this mailing list.

===
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/attachments/20240412/18cb9a68/attachment.htm>