Climate Change and Health Hazards: Addressing Hazards to Human and Environmental Health from a Changing Climate

This book contains a set of papers which explore the links among climate change, health, and hazards and demonstrate how they interact. It emphasizes the urgency of immediate and more ambitious action to address climate risks. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), human-induced climate change is known to be causing dangerous and widespread disruptions in nature and is affecting the lives of billions of people around the world, despite efforts to reduce the risks. Climate change is also negatively influencing health and is mounting threat to our wellbeing and a healthy planet.

The world is also facing significant climate hazards over the next two decades, with global warming expected to soon reach 1.5 C. Even temporarily exceeding this warming level will result in additional severe impacts, some of which may be irreversible. There is therefore a perceived need for publications which may foster a greater understanding of how climate change connects to human health and the role played by hazards in this context. It is against this background that this book is being prepared.