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The Silent Suffering
Science is now unequivocal as to the reality of climate change. However, one facet - its human face - has been dangerously neglected. Until now. Given what the science tells us about global warming, how many people around the world will be affected, in what way, and at what cost?
These are the questions that a major new report attempts to answer for the first time. Its findings indicate that hundreds of millions of people are already permanently or temporarily affected, and half a billion are at extreme risk now. Because of climate change, each year hundreds of thousands lose their lives. All these figures are set to increase rapidly in as little as 10-20 years.
This publication, from the Global Humanitarian Forum, of which I am a board member, constitutes the most plausible estimate of the human impacts of climate change today. The scale of devastation is so great that it is hard to believe the truth behind it, or how it is possible that so many people remain ignorant of this crisis.
Four main factors have contributed to the silence. First, while the world has been coming to terms with the science of climate change, the problem has moved from being a future threat to a current danger. Climate change is an evolving concern, affecting people now.
Second, 99% of the casualties linked to climate change occur in developing countries. Worst hit are the world's poorest groups. While climate change will increasingly affect wealthy countries, the brunt of the impact is being borne by the poor, whose plight simply receives less attention.
Third, and worse, climate change hides its influence among a wide range of today's key global problems. It impacts heavily on nutrition and diseases such as malaria, and increases poverty. But that impact can be lost among the many contributing factors.
That is why a fourth major challenge is the current inability to separate the impacts of climate change in specific situations. It is impossible to say, for example, how much the severity of any hurricane is due to climate change.
It is time, however, to break the silence. It may not be possible to pin-point specific situations, or to achieve unequivocal global consensus. It took the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 19 years to accomplish a consensus on the science in its 2007 report. But the general changes in the global climate system are clear: the number and intensity of extreme weather events, such as major floods and storms, has increased steadily in the last 30 years. Temperature changes show similar patterns, as do cyclone trajectories and rainfall patterns. From these changes it is possible to make good estimates about their global impacts on people.
That tells us who is worst affected: the poor, who are largely unprepared, and unable to cope with climatic change. Of course, wealthy countries are affected: long-term drought in Australia has caused certain crop yields to plummet. But the poor lack the resources to prevent disasters or adapt to changed conditions. Many already subsist on the mere threshold of survival.
Next week a series of UN talks will take place in Bonn - one of the last stepping stones in the effort to reach international agreement on how the world should tackle climate change, at the Copenhagen summit in December. Any post-Kyoto agreement must take into account the tremendous scale of suffering already being caused today.
There is a great responsibility for major polluters to protect the poorest populations from a problem for which they cannot be held responsible. Their silent suffering must serve as a warning signal of the greater suffering that lies in store for the rest of us if we fail to tackle climate change together.
10 Comments so far
Show AllThe silence has been broken for some time now, and no actual action will be taken until the rich and powerful leaders begin to actually find themselves globally warmed to the point of fear and discomfort.
The poor, among whom many of us will shortly be, are to be sacrificed under "the ethics of the lifeboat". High tech modern military stuff will be put to use to keep the desperate poor from threatening the comfort of the rich and powerful until things get so bad even they will find themselves also "largely unprepared and unable to cope with climatic change."
This now much older dumb stupid Indian stopped talking to people about the destruction of the earth in 1987 or 1988.
In prophecy Creator states if it were not for him interceeding at some point on behalf the human race, his Elect, then human being would kill themselves off completely.
While I don't give any false illusion that Indian living in this land was completely perfect if human beings around the planet had lived like the Tribes uses to live with the earth they probably wouldn't ben be talking about the destruction of the earth. The only way human beings wouldn't destroy themselves by their own hands through their destruction of the earth or through nuclear weapons would have been to live that way.
I just tell our European friends visiting our land saying Save The Earth to turn off their electricity. Yeah yeah yeah, and how soon would their stores be empty of food?
Once a money money money based globalist earth destroying system of Mammon is built upon the earth then it becomes very difficult to un-destroy the earth, but that is what Prophecy states will happen upon the earth.
Creator watches. Creator listens.
ShadowDancer: "older dumb stupid Indian"
Question: Do you realize how old, dumb and stupid that statement is?
Jesus was right about the rich. They need to sell everything they have and give it to the poor. A camel has a greater chance of God's acceptance. Nonetheless, they will stick it to the poor until the end. And they will call themselves Christians and Jews and Muslims while they do it. No wonder Jesus preferred the company of robbers and prostitutes.
Yes, honest (survival) professions. Another way to think about riches is that it is OK to own things but it is not OK for things to own you. Other cultures say that everything that we possess belongs to the Angel of Death who will take it all back whenever he chooses - but for now it is on loan.
loopless : "Jesus was right about the rich".
I agree. Throughout history, many mythical figures with the exact same story as Jesus (virgin mother, raised from the dead, son of God, etc) have warned about "the rich". The way I see it, "rich" is a criminal state. No one should be allowed to "own" billions while people are starving to death.
If we lock up Bloomberg in prison for life and confiscate everything, we can start a program in a poor country that provides food, shelter, medical assistance and education to an entire town or village for generations. That's what Jesus would do.
The crisis (floods, devastation, hunger) that will be brought on by advanced global warming is the only thing with the power to bring about the anger needed for the people to walk up to those who run this world and destroyed our habitat for profit, butcher them and eat them for survival.
global problems require global participation and global solutions.
a world government.if warming will cause oceans to rise and deserts to expand. as human beings, we must ask our selves what meaning does the universal declaration of human rights have if as citizens of the industrialized north - we allow our fellow earthlings to suffer b/c of circumstances beyond their control.
i agree that climate change has been accelerated by human
intervention. but, even if the climate change was a 'natural'
phenomina - once the situation was recognized, humans would still
have to adapt. considering 90% of the human population lives
w/ in 100 miles of the coastline. it means most of us will have to
adapt, the whole world.
the dutch are living on the water, the arabs have built an island.
the americans have lsats and geo thermal satellites.
there's no reason we can't develop desalination plants, modular
housing, massive reforestation projects.
the earth is a living organism. if we want to remain guests on the planet, we need to act responsibly as a species (including recognition of our interdependence with other flora and fauna on the planet).
capitalism (greed/power based incentives) , oil based energy
systems, militarism and the arbitrary (not so arbitrary) nation
state system are all huge impediments, preventing humanity from
honestly addressing the serious issue of impending climate catastrophes.
let's shed our national identities and start addressing each other as humans instead of bangladeshis and americans.
...peace...
yea
From the title, I thought this was going to be another pointless pro-life screed about "silent" babies suffering under abortion laws.
I re-use everything from clothing to toothpaste. Most people don't know that if you brush your teeth and spit into a cup, you can re-use the tooth paste for up to a week!
Think Globally, ACT, ACT, ACT