Climate Change
Global climate change is now recognised as an important concern for health and health policy. The Centre on Global Change and Health is one of the leading research groups on climate change and health in the world. Centre staffs have contributed to national, regional and global assessments on the potential impacts of climate change, including the Second, Third and Fourth Assessment Reports of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The 61st World Health Assembly in May 2008 adopted an important resolution on climate change that identified the need for countries to develop response measures for dealing with climate change. Since 2007, we have been a WHO Collaborating Centre, and provide scientific advice to support health policy making at WHO and its Member States.
Current scientific evidence indicates that climate
change will contribute to the global burden of disease through increases
in extreme weather events, diarrhoeal disease, vector-borne disease
and malnutrition. We are continuing to develop methods for quantifying
the health risks associated with climate change at the national,
regional and global level. Centre research has focused on improving
the evidence base for developing effective public health responses
extreme weather events, particularly heat waves and floods events.
Projects
Publications
- Kovats RS, Ebi K, Menne B (2003) Methods of assessing
human health vulnerability and public health adaptation to climate
change. WHO, Health Canada, UNEP, WMO, Copenhagen. (Health
and Global Environmental Change Series, No. 1.
- McMichael AJ, Campbell-Lendrum D, Kovats RS, Edwards
S, Wilkinson P, Edmonds N, Nicholls N, Hales S, Tanser
FC, Le Sueur D, Schlesinger M, Andronova N (2004) Climate
change. In Comparative Quantification of Health Risks: Global
and Regional Burden of Disease due to Selected Major Risk Factors,
vol 2. M. Ezzati et al., eds., World Health Organization, Geneva.
- Kovats RS, D Campbell-Lendrum, F Matthies (2005) Climate
change and human health: estimating avoidable deaths.
Risk Analysis, 25(6):1409-1418.
- Ahern M, RS Kovats, P Wilkinson, R Few, F Matthies
(2005) Global health impacts of floods: epidemiologic evidence.
Epidemiologic Reviews, 27:36-46.
- Haines A, Kovats RS, Campbell-Lendrum D, Corvalan
C (2006) Climate change and human health - impacts, vulnerability
and public health. Journal of Public Health, 120: 585-596.
- Haines A, Kovats RS, Campbell-Lendrum D, Corvalan
C (2006) Harben Lecture: Climate change and human health
- impacts, vulnerability and mitigation. Lancet, 367:
2101-2109.
- Ebi KL, Kovats RS, Menne B (2006) An approach for
assessing human health vulnerability and public health interventions
to adapt to climate change. Environmental Health Perspectives,
114(12): 1930-4.
- Kovats RS, Ebi KL (2006) Heatwaves and public health
in Europe. European Journal of Public Health, 16(6): 592-599.
- Kovats RS (2006) Heatwaves and health protection.
[Invited Editorial]; BMJ, 33: 314-315.
- Huq S, Kovats RS, Reid H, Satterthwaite D (2007) Reducing
risks to cities from disasters and climate change. [Editorial];
Environment and Urbanization, 19(1): 3-15.
- Lloyd S, Kovats RS, Armstrong B (2007) Global
cross-sectional study of the association between diarrhoea morbidity,
weather and climate. Climate Research, 34(2): 119-127.
- Hajat S, Kovats RS, Lachowycz K (2007) Heat-related
and cold-related deaths in England and Wales: who is at risk?
Occupation Environ Med, 64:93-100.
- Khan A, Kumar Mojumder S, Kovats RS, Vineis P (2008)
Saline contamination of drinking water in Bangladesh
[letter]; Lancet, 371:385.
- Kovats RS, Hajat S (2008) Heat stress and public
health: a critical review. Annual Review of Public Health
(in press).
- Kovats RS, Akhtar R (2008) Climate, climate change
and health in Asian cities. Environment and Urbanization,
(in press).
Top
|
Home