How climate change affects the health of Florida residents

Most people think that climate change is a problem of the future that needs to be prevented now, but there is no point in worrying about its impact on people yet.

Фото: Depositphotos

But doctors in Florida said they already see how climate change has a negative impact on the health of the people in the region, writes Miami Herald.

Doctors have come together to convey to politicians and the public the danger of a more humid and hot climate, which is already affecting the health of vulnerable groups of patients.

Dr. Cheryl Holder, president of the Florida State Medical Association, described how an elderly patient came to her clinic. She came to the doctor with two requests - to prescribe her more medicine and to sign a form for the company that provides her electricity.

The woman suffers from asthma, and because of the heat in South Florida, her condition worsened, so she used the medicines prescribed for her earlier than expected. In order to somehow cope with the heat, the woman installed an air conditioner in her house, but at the end of the month the electricity bill threw her into shock, she could not afford to pay such bills on a monthly basis.

Therefore, she asked Holder to sign a special form for the company. Florida Power & Light, certifying that she has equipment in her home that is important to her life—such as a fan or a sprayer—that would get her a discount on her electricity bill.

But since the woman, in fact, did not use such equipment, and the air conditioner is not on the list of devices for which you can get a discount, Holder did not sign the form, but prescribed additional medication for the patient so that she could keep asthma under control.

Holder notes that because of the increase in heat and humidity in Florida, these patients will increase over time.

She is not the only doctor concerned about this situation. Doctors across the state banded together to form Florida Clinical Action. The goal of the group is to inform the public about how climate change is already affecting public health.

Hot weather adversely affects the health of patients with asthma, heart and lung diseases, and even those who suffer from mental disorders. Increased humidity leads to more frequent flooding and flooding, and this water in turn contributes to the spread of viral and bacterial diseases.

The most vulnerable to the effects of climate change and its impact on health are low-income people and elderly patients.

This is due to the fact that they often cannot afford the equipment to counter climate change, and they are not able to pay the growing bills of medical professionals who can help with the prevention or treatment of the negative effects that warming has on human health.

Doctors have launched an information campaign in the community to make sure that everyone is aware of the effects of climate change and how to protect themselves, ranging from school teachers who can explain to children what the first signs of heat stroke are, and ending with politicians who need to take care of creating cooling centers for homeless and low-income residents of the region.

According to a Yale University survey, 70% of Florida residents are aware of climate change, but only 41% believe that this will affect them personally.

Doctors believe that they will be able to reduce this gap, because only a few people can communicate with a professional climatologist to hear from him about the essence of the problem, but everyone turns to doctors, therefore their sphere of influence is much wider.

At the state level in Florida, there is only one government program to combat climate change.

This is a BRACE project (Building Resilience Against Climate Effects) funded by the Centers for Disease Control. The program was launched by the Florida Department of Health in the 2012 year, but was transferred to the University of Florida in the 2016 year.

Project manager Chris Yuechgio said the program allocated about 1 a million dollars in grants over five years to district health departments to help them prepare for the effects of climate change and its impact on human health. These grants can finance just about anything from tree planting to improving hurricane preparedness plans, which are also a consequence of climate change.

But this is the only program at the state level in recent years dedicated to the link between climate change and human health, despite the fact that Florida tops the lists of the most vulnerable regions to climate change.

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