Fossil fuel 'addiction' starving, killing millions: Report

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A new study published by the medical journal The Lancet reports that climate change is causing 98 million people to face severe food insecurity and 103 countries to face heat-related death surges. 

The report, which was published ahead of the upcoming UN COP27 climate summit in Egypt next month, adds that an estimated 11,800 Americans and 1.2 million people globally die every year due to intoxication from air pollution.

Fossil fuel addiction is to blame, as the burning of coal, oil, and natural gas is causing the quality of the air to deteriorate.

In the 103 countries examined in this study, the researchers found that land impacted by extreme drought has increased by 29% in the past 50 years. 

Between 2017-2021, heat-related deaths jumped 68% compared to 2000-2004, with risks of very-high or extremely-high fire danger increasing in 61% of countries from 2001-2004 to 2018-2021.

Moreover, heat caused 470 billion potential labor hours to be wasted in 2021. This had a severe impact on widening the gap between low- and middle-income countries. 

Global warming is also causing infectious diseases to spread at unprecedented rates, with malaria increasing to 2.1% in highland areas of the US and 14.9% in Africa between 2012 and 2021, compared to the 1950s.

All these factors are negatively impacting family incomes due to their effect on workers' productivity, as well as exacerbating food insecurity as crop yields are dying out due to extreme heat. 

Carbon intensity from global energy systems did however drop by less than 1% from the 1992 levels, the report says.

While 69 out of the 86 states included in the study allocated expenditures on fossil fuels at a collective cost of $400 billion in 2019, governments "have so far failed to provide the smaller sum of $100 billion per year to help support climate action in lower-income countries."

"The world is edging closer to multiple tipping points that, once crossed, will drive temperatures well above 2°C ... current global actions are insufficient," the researchers said in the report's editorial. 

Commenting on the report, UN Secretary-General, António Guterres said, "The climate crisis is killing us," while calling for "common-sense investments in renewable energy."

Observers who agreed that fossil fuel addiction is an undisputable fact include University of Maryland professor Sacoby Wilson and University of Calgary medicine professor Courtney Howard.

Howard pointed out that heat-related deaths have had no impact on thwarting fossil fuel use, defining addiction in medical terms as being the "continuing in habitual behavior despite known harms."

As for environmental health professor Wilson, the report highlights that people "are dying now" from climate change and that "droughts, desertification, not having food, flooding, tsunamis" are just some of the many catastrophes generated by this crisis, while referencing floods that devastated Pakistan and Nigeria this year.

DHAKA, Bangladesh — A tropical storm that lashed Bangladesh left at least 24 people dead and about 8 million without power across the delta nation. About 10,000 homes were damaged and more than 6,000 hectares of crops were destroyed. https://t.co/H6lHUjQ70b pic.twitter.com/vFYjyfk64h

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