30 Oct 2012

GENEVA / CLIMATE HEALTH HAZARDS

As hurricane Sandy bore down on the eastern US coast, the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warned that hazards to human health are increasing as the world's climate continues to change. The agencies on Monday (29 October) published The Atlas of Health and Climate which illustrates some of the most pressing current and emerging challenges. WHO

Posted at: October 30, 2012 11:24 am

Duration: 05:03

Available in: SD

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Full script

STORY: GENEVA / CLIMATE HEALTH HAZARDS
TRT: 5.03
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
SOURCE: WHO
LANGUAGE: ENGLISH / NATS

DATELINE: 29 OCTOBER 2012, GENEVA, SWITZERLAND

SHOTLIST:

1. Wide shot, press conference
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Michel Jarraud, General-Secretary, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
"Climate change, as we know, is altering the magnitude, frequency, duration of extreme events and over the recent few weeks and days, we have been reminded of several of these extreme events."
3. Close up, report
4.  SOUNDBITE (English) Michel Jarraud, General-Secretary, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
"Heat and cold wave, tropical cyclones, floods, droughts, other natural hazards. They can cause tens of thousands of deaths and hundreds of thousands of injuries every year around the world."
5. Close up, report
6. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"The World Health Organization welcomes this Atlas of Health and Climate. It is a unique scientific tool for improving, you know, our response to a number of climate sensitive diseases and health conditions."
7. Close up, report
8. SOUNDBITE (English) Michel Jarraud, General-Secretary, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
"The evidence of such benefits (when health and climate services join forces) continues to expand, as some of the examples which you will find in this atlas show. This morning you talk about malaria, meningitis, many things. Indeed climate factors are known to have influence on the dynamics of many of these diseases."
9. Med shot, journalists 
10.  SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"We are very passionate about this collaboration, because at the end of the day, human capital and human security is, you know, the most important asset contributing to sustainable development in every country. And, if we can make full use of these scientific data coming from climate and weather data, to provide early warning to countries..."
11. Close up, report
12. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"... so that they can prepare and prevent devastations arising from either natural disasters, as we are talking, you know, Hurricane Sandy, and then of course, many diseases, including malaria, dengue, meningitis, you know, just a few examples, these are what we call 'climate sensitive diseases'. Because, you know, such dimensions, climate dimensions like rainfall, humidity and temperature, would influence the epidemics, the outbreaks, either directly influencing the parasites or the mosquitos that carry them."
13. Wide shot, journalists
14. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"... and all the animal sectors that are passing the disease are crossing the species barrier from animal to human. And we have seen this again and again and again. If I tell you, eighty percent of the new diseases affecting humans in the past forty years come primarily from the animal sector."
15. Close up, report
16. SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"I give you one specific example. Meningitis, bacterial meningitis. Every year, when the hot and dusty wind of hamatan comes, blowing across the meningitis belt, this is a belt covering more than 20 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. We will see the linkage between the hot and dusty wind was outbreak of meningitis. And many children, especially children below the age of 15, many of them are affected. And when they are affected, you lose life, and those who survive, suffer from mental damage. And this is extremely important. So what we do now is: In advance of the coming of the wind, because of this climate information, this allow us to do early warnings. So what do we do? We pre-position and make sure that the vaccination campaign takes place before the coming of the wind, so that children are protected."
17. Zoom in, cameraman

STORYLINE:

As Hurricane Sandy bore down on the East Coast of the United States today (29 October), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) warned that hazards to human health are increasing as the world's climate continues to change.

SOUNDBITE (English) Michel Jarraud, General-Secretary, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
"Climate change, as we know, is altering the magnitude, frequency, duration of extreme events and over the recent few weeks and days, we have been reminded of several of these extreme events."

SOUNDBITE (English) Michel Jarraud, General-Secretary, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
"Heat and cold wave, tropical cyclones, floods, droughts, other natural hazards. They can cause tens of thousands of deaths and hundreds of thousands of injuries every year around the world."

The two agencies today published The Atlas of Health and Climate which illustrates some of the most pressing current and emerging challenges.

SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"The World Health Organization welcomes this Atlas of Health and Climate. It is a unique scientific tool for improving, you know, our response to a number of climate sensitive diseases and health conditions."

Droughts, floods and cyclones affect the health of millions of people each year. Climate variability and extreme conditions such as floods can also trigger epidemics of diseases such as diarrhoea, malaria, dengue and meningitis, which cause death and suffering for many millions more. The Atlas gives practical examples of how the use of weather and climate information can protect public health.

SOUNDBITE (English) Michel Jarraud, General-Secretary, World Meteorological Organization (WMO):
"The evidence of such benefits (when health and climate services join forces) continues to expand, as some of the examples which you will find in this atlas show. This morning you talk about malaria, meningitis, many things. Indeed climate factors are known to have influence on the dynamics of many of these diseases."

Numerous maps, tables and graphs assembled in the Atlas make the links between health and climate more explicit:

SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"We are very passionate about this collaboration, because at the end of the day, human capital and human security is, you know, the most important asset contributing to sustainable development in every country. And, if we can make full use of these scientific data coming from climate and weather data, to provide early warning to countries..."

SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"... so that they can prepare and prevent devastations arising from either natural disasters, as we are talking, you know, Hurricane Sandy, and then of course, many diseases, including malaria, dengue, meningitis, you know, just a few examples, these are what we call 'climate sensitive diseases'. Because, you know, such dimensions, climate dimensions like rainfall, humidity and temperature, would influence the epidemics, the outbreaks, either directly influencing the parasites or the mosquitos that carry them."

In some locations the incidence of infectious diseases such as malaria, dengue, meningitis and cholera can vary by factors of more than 100 between seasons, and significantly between years, depending on weather and climate conditions. Stronger climate services in endemic countries can help predict the onset, intensity and duration of epidemics.

Case studies illustrate how collaboration between meteorological, emergency and health services is already saving lives.  For example, the death toll from cyclones of similar intensity in Bangladesh reduced from around 500,000 in 1970, to 140,000 in 1991, to 3,000 in 2007 – largely thanks to improved early warning systems and preparedness.

SOUNDBITE (English) Dr. Margaret Chan, Director-General, World Health Organization (WHO):
"I give you one specific example. Meningitis, bacterial meningitis. Every year, when the hot and dusty wind of hamatan comes, blowing across the meningitis belt, this is a belt covering more than 20 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. We will see the linkage between the hot and dusty wind was outbreak of meningitis. And many children, especially children below the age of 15, many of them are affected. And when they are affected, you lose life, and those who survive, suffer from mental damage. And this is extremely important. So what we do now is: In advance of the coming of the wind, because of this climate information, this allow us to do early warnings. So what do we do? We pre-position and make sure that the vaccination campaign takes place before the coming of the wind, so that children are protected."

Heat extremes that would currently be expected to occur only once in 20 years, may occur on average every 2-5 years by the middle of this century.  At the same time, the number of older people living in cities (one of the most vulnerable groups to heat stress), will almost quadruple globally, from 380 million in 2010, to 1.4 billion in 2050. Cooperation between health and climate services can trigger measures to better protect people during periods of extreme weather.

Shifting to clean household energy sources would both reduce climate change, and save the lives of approximately 680 000 children a year from reduced air pollution. The Atlas also shows how meteorological and health services can collaborate to monitor air pollution and its health impacts.

In addition, the unique tool shows how the relationship between health and climate is shaped by other vulnerabilities, such as those created by poverty, environmental degradation, and poor infrastructure, especially for water and sanitation.

The Atlas is being released at an Extraordinary Session of the World Meteorological Congress, being held in Geneva, Switzerland from 29-31 October. The Congress will discuss the structure and implementation of the draft Global Framework for Climate Services.   
 
The framework is a United Nations-wide initiative spearheaded by WMO to strengthen the provision of climate services to the benefit of society, especially the most vulnerable. The health sector is one of the top four priorities, alongside food security, water management and disaster risk reduction.