7/5/2023 0 Comments Current corona weather![]() ![]() In places where air pollution is a routine problem, we have to pay particular attention to individuals who may be more exposed or vulnerable than others to polluted air, such as the homeless, those who don’t have air filtration in their homes, or those whose health is already compromised. This finding is consistent with prior research that has shown that people who are exposed to more air pollution and who smoke fare worse with respiratory infections than those who are breathing cleaner air, and who don’t smoke. Recent research from Rachel Nethery, Xiauo Wu, Francesca Dominici and other colleagues at Harvard Chan has found that people who live in places with poor air quality are more likely to die from COVID-19 even when accounting for other factors that may influence risk of death such as pre-existing medical conditions, socioeconomic status, and access to healthcare. Does air pollution increase the risk of getting coronavirus? Does it make symptoms worse? We have many reasons to take climate action to improve our health and reducing risks for infectious disease emergence is one of them. Less demand for animal meat and more sustainable animal husbandry could decrease emerging infectious disease risk and lower greenhouse gas emissions. Large livestock farms can also serve as a source for spillover of infections from animals to people. Loss of habitat forces animals to migrate and potentially contact other animals or people and share germs. Deforestation, which occurs mostly for agricultural purposes, is the largest cause of habitat loss worldwide. Many of the root causes of climate change also increase the risk of pandemics. That means animals are coming into contact with other animals they normally wouldn’t, and that creates an opportunity for pathogens to get into new hosts. We don’t have direct evidence that climate change is influencing the spread of COVID-19, but we do know that climate change alters how we relate to other species on Earth and that matters to our health and our risk for infections.Īs the planet heats up, animals big and small, on land and in the sea, are headed to the poles to get out of the heat.
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