Facing the Music

A robust response to climate change presents “the greatest global health opportunity” this century; ignoring it could reverse decades of public health progress, according to the Lancet Countdown.
 
Building on the Lancet’s 2015 Commission on Health and Climate Change, the Countdown tracks progress on the Paris Agreement and the health impacts of climate change.
 
It found climate change’s toll on human health is “potentially irreversible,” and concentrated in vulnerable populations. Weather-related disasters increased 46% since 2000, the report shows.
 
But recent years have seen progress like the “inevitable” move to low-carbon energy and a tripling of scientific papers on health and climate change since 2007.

The Lancet (free registration required)