by Michael Smith (Veshengro)
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which has come under fire for, apparently, discounting the impact of climate change, has now come out and said global warming poses real risk to human health and the American way of life.
Risks include, according to the EPA in a new report, more heat-related deaths, more heart and lung diseases due to increased ozone and health problems related to hurricanes, extreme precipitation and wildfires.
"Climate change poses real risk to human health and the human systems that support our way of life in the United States," the agency's Joel Scheraga said in a telephone briefing.
The report does not specify, however, how many people in the United States could die due to climate change, because that number can be changed by taking action, Scheraga said.
There is one problem with that equation, as I have said in other articles already, and that is that we will have a problem with that theory if, as I, and many others, believe that Climate Change is not so much cause by the action of Man but more a cyclic event of the Earth itself. If it is the latter than we must take other actions as well so as to minimize the impact and to learn and live with the changes in our climate on a local as well as worldwide level.
Climate change is expected to affect water supplies across the United States, as well as other countries, with reduced water flow in rivers, lower groundwater levels and more salt creeping into coastal rivers and groundwater.
People who live along the coasts will face the consequences of rising sea levels and severe weather events while city dwellers can expect higher energy demand to cool buildings -- though the demand for heat will probably decline – if we are lucky.
We must do two things... and that is to (1) look at reducing anything that could be a contributing factor to climate change and (2) prepare for the possibility climate change is not man-made and that there is nothing or little that we can to stop it. That is to say that this, more than likely, a cycle that the Earth goes through every so many centuries and if that is the case, as I believe it is, we must prepare for this at the same time.
I am not saying that we should not reduce any pollution and emissions and should not work on renewable energy and such. We must do so indeed and the same as regards to recycling, waste reduction, reusing, upcycling, and all those steps.
Let's go and do it...
© M Smith (Veshengro), July 2008
American way of life put at risk through climate change
