The human population of earth is getting older. Fewer children are being born. Cared for the aged and aging is going to become a growing issue, and the medical research is clear, as this research article describes. By 2050, because of the greed I described in the preceding report, as many as an additional 246 million adults age 69 and older could experience temperature extremes that exceed 37.5° Celsius, (99°F). Read what that will mean, and recognize we are a species destroying their own wellbeing.
An older man shields himself from the heat in Beijing in July of 2023. By mid-century, more adults age 69 and older will face extreme heat, especially those residing in Asia and Africa. Credit: Wang Zho / AP
Nearly a quarter of the global population of older adults at mid-century could face extreme heat, putting their health in danger.
By 2050, as many as an additional 246 million adults age 69 and older could experience temperature extremes that exceed 37.5° Celsius, (99°F) researchers report May 14 in Nature Communications. The new projection suggests that more than 23 percent of the global population of these older adults — largely concentrated in Africa and Asia — will encounter this intense heat, compared with 14 percent today.
“Protecting our older population will be increasingly critical in the years to come,” says cardiologist-epidemiologist Andrew Chang of Stanford University and the University of California, San Fransisco, who was not involved with the research. “Older adults can be exquisitely vulnerable to the impacts […]
The majority of voters in Florida elected a governor and state legislature that is openly and actively destroying their future. Large parts of Florida are going to disappear under the sea; it has already started. The rest of the state that stays above the sea will still face all kinds of temperature and water problems as well as other crises. Already there are parts of the coastal regions where homeowners cannot get property insurance.
Republican christofascist Governor of Florida Ron DeSantis speaks at the Governor’s Day luncheon, Feb. 8, 2024, in Tampa, Fla. Climate change will be a lesser priority in Florida and largely disappear from state statutes under legislation signed Wednesday, May 15 by Gov. DeSantis, which also bans power-generating wind turbines offshore or near the state’s lengthy coastlines. Credit: Chris O’Meara / AP
TALLAHASSEE, FLORIDA — Climate change will be a lesser priority in Florida and largely disappear from state statutes under legislation signed Wednesday by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis that also bans power-generating wind turbines offshore or near the state’s lengthy coastline.
Critics said the measure made law by the former Republican presidential hopeful ignores the reality of climate change threats in Florida, including projections of rising seas, extreme heat and flooding and increasingly severe storms.
It takes effect July 1 and would also boost expansion of natural gas, reduce regulation on gas pipelines in the state and increase protections against bans on gas appliances such as stoves, according to a news release from the governor’s office.
As the climate changes and an increasing number of researchers look at the effects it is likely to produce the news that comes out of their work is ever more alarming. Here is the latest I have read about.
Credit: CC0 Public Domain
Climate change, and its effects on weather patterns and adverse weather events, is likely to negatively affect the health of people with brain conditions, argues a UCL-led team of researchers.
In a Personal View article, published in The Lancet Neurology, the team emphasizes the urgent need to understand the impact of climate change on people with neurological conditions—in order to preserve their health and prevent worsening inequalities.
Following a review of 332 papers published across the world between 1968 and 2023, the researchers, led by Professor Sanjay Sisodiya (UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology), said they expect the scale of the potential effects of climate change on neurological diseases to be substantial.
They considered 19 different nervous system conditions, chosen on the basis of the Global Burden of Disease 2016 study, including stroke, migraine, Alzheimer’s, meningitis, epilepsy and multiple sclerosis.
The team also analyzed the impact of climate change on several serious but common psychiatric disorders, including anxiety, depression and schizophrenia.
Professor Sisodiya, who is also Director of Genomics at the Epilepsy Society and […]
Here is some way too late, but nonetheless still good news. Finally, the country is beginning to seriously restructure the electrical grid to prepare for the conversions to Renewables.
Electric power lines are attached to the transmission tower along the power grid in the Everglades, Florida on Sept. 28, 2023. Credit: Joe Raedle / Getty
The United States Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) on Monday approved the first overhaul of the country’s electric transmission policy in more than a decade.
The changes will make new interregional lines faster and bring more renewable energy to meet increasing demand.
“Our country is facing an unprecedented surge in demand for affordable electricity while confronting extreme weather threats to the reliability of our grid and trying to stay one step ahead of the massive technological changes we are seeing in our society,” said FERC Chairman Willie Phillips in a press release from FERC. “Our nation needs a new foundation to get badly needed new transmission planned, paid for and built. With this new rule, that starts today.”
The rule is the first time FERC has directly addressed the country’s need for long-term energy transmission planning and will help achieve President Joe Biden’s target of decarbonizing the U.S. […]
This is very sad news for those of us who worked so hard to end school segregation and bad news for the United States. We are going in the wrong direction in so many ways.
Racial segregation in schools across the country has increased dramatically over the last three decades, according to two new reports and an Axios review of federal data.
Decades after Brown and the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the U.S. has moved toward policies that increased the isolation of Black and Latino students by race and poverty.
This month, Axios will commemorate the May 17, 1954, Supreme Court decision — that “in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place” — by examining the state of public schools and how these new inequalities have emerged.
The big picture: The resegregation of America’s public schools coincides with the rise ofcharter schools and school choice options, and as civil rights groups have turned away from desegregation battles.
Segregated schools disproportionately hurt Black and […]
