More than a billion people to flee their homes because of global warming

News24xx.com -  According to a new study from The Lancet, more than a billion people could be forced to flee their homes because of global warming. The movement of people, as well as the various effects of climate change, could be about to trigger a major health crisis.

Global warming is already leading some to conclude the climate-change migrants are being forced to move because of extreme changes in the amount of rain and temperature changes destroying their ability to farm.

Some have blamed the Syrian conflict on migration into the cities that was caused by a drought that seems to have been induced by climate change.

It notes that migration driven by climate change has potentially severe impacts on mental and physical health, both directly and through the disruption of essential health and social services.

It found that global exposure to dangerous levels of air pollution caused by burning fossil fuels had increased by 11.2 per cent since 1990 with more than 70 per cent of cities exceeding WHO PM2.5 limits.

Many British cities also broke the WHO limits for PM10s.

The authors acknowledged that European Union air quality guidelines were far less stringent than those of the WHO, with an upper safety limit for PM2.5s of 25 micrograms per cubic metre.

However, they said the WHO limits represented a safer threshold.

The report added that 802 London schools and a high proportion of the capital’s hospitals and clinics were located in highly polluted areas potentially putting some of society’s most vulnerable people at risk.

Diesel-powered vehicles, which generate pollution particles, were one of the key drivers of poor air quality in towns and cities in the UK.

The report pointed out that between 2000 and 2016 there had been a 46 per cent increase in the number of weather-related disasters around the world. During the same period of time 125 million vulnerable adults over the age of 65 had been exposed to heatwaves.

In addition, climate change had increased the threat from mosquito-borne infectious diseases.

Transmission of dengue fever by the Aedes agypti mosquito had increased by 9.4 per cent since 1950.

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