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By Adam Vaughan

Rafa Alcaide/EPA/Shutterstock

The impacts of climate change on people’s health around the world, including deaths due to heatwaves and the consequences of food insecurity, are at their “most worrying” since an international initiative began tracking them five years ago.

All 16 indicators of the health impacts of a warming world are worsening, the Lancet Countdown report published today shows. “Climate change-induced shocks are claiming lives, damaging health and disrupting livelihoods in all parts of the world right now. That means no continent or community remains untouched,” says Ian Hamilton at University College London.

The report found that between 2000 and 2018, the number of heat-related deaths each year in people aged over 65 jumped by almost 54 per cent to 296,000 globally. Most were in Japan, China, India and Europe.

More than half of 196 countries saw an increase in the risk of people exposed to wildfires between 2016-2019, compared with 2001-2004. Based on area rather than people, Australia saw one of the biggest increases in wildfire risk between the same periods.

Due to the greenhouse gas-intensive nature of beef production, the researchers also looked at the health impacts of eating it. They found deaths from excess red meat consumption hit 990,000 in 2017, up 72 per cent since 1990, with much of the increase in China.

The team behind the report urged governments to make sure the carbon-cutting plans they submit to the United Nations ahead of the COP26 climate summit next year – known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) – are not just bold, but factor in health. “At the moment health is not featuring among the NDCs in the way that it needs to,” says Hamilton, who is director of the Lancet Countdown initiative.

Journal reference: The Lancet, in press