“Since the turn of the century, the number of reported cases of Dengue has increased 8-fold.” And the virus now affects “over 130 countries, including Italy, which has reported more than 100 cases since the beginning of this year“. The vision of Hans Kluge, regional director of the World Health Organization for Europe, is that “the biggest obstacle to fighting climate change is the political will needed to make the structural and social changes necessary to prevent impacts worse.”
The role of climate change
“Climate change exacerbates the burden of communicable and non-communicable diseases in the European region.” It is for example “leading to changes in mosquito behavior, distribution, movement and intensitybirds and other animals that are spreading infectious diseases such as Dengue and malaria to new areas”. Among the indirect impacts there is also the growing weight, often ignored, of climate change on mental health” as in the case of “eco-anxiety in young people, reaction to perceived inaction and feelings of helplessness in the face of imminent catastrophe”
“We are now faced with a precarious future – he highlights to Adnkronos Salute on the occasion of his visit to Italy for the 20th anniversary of the WHO Office in Venice – unless we all take urgent action to correct the course. The countries of European region feels the brunt of climate change, here and now. We are facing a triple crisis: climate change, environmental pollution and loss of biodiversitywhich together threaten our very existence on the planet.”
“We need immediate intervention”
Without urgent action, we risk undoing the progress made over the last 50 years in the field of public health”, he urges, recalling that “one of the key recommendations of the Monti Commission was to place greater emphasis on the 'One Health' principle, that ours sees well-being as inextricably linked to the health of the planet and the natural environment“.
To give an idea of the weight that the climate factor has, Kluge recalls the analyzes and debate that took place on Covid: “It is believed that human activities such as deforestation, trade and consumption of wildlife and international travel have led to the appearance of Covid-19 and facilitated its global spread”.
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