Global warming
is likely to disproportionately harm the health of children, and politicians
should launch "aggressive policies" to curb climate change, the American
Academy of Pediatrics said today.
In the first
major report about the unique effects of global warming on kids, U.S. pediatricians
also were advised to "educate" elected officials about the coming dangers.
There's evidence
that children are likely to suffer more than adults from climate change,
says the report's lead author, Katherine Shea, a pediatrician and adjunct
public health professor at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.
"We already
have change, and certain bad things are going to happen no matter what
we do," Shea says. "But we can prevent things from getting even worse.
We don't have the luxury of waiting."
More greenhouse
gases and a warming Earth will leave children particularly vulnerable in
several ways, the report says:
•Air pollution does
more damage to children's lungs, causing asthma and respiratory ailments,
because their lungs are still developing, they breathe at a higher rate
than adults and are outdoors more.
•Waterborne infections, such
as diarrhea and other gastrointestinal problems, hit children especially
hard. These infections rise sharply with more rain, which is expected as
the climate warms.
•As mosquitoes are able to
move to higher ground, the malaria zone is expanding. Kids are especially
vulnerable; 75% of malaria deaths occur in children younger than 5.
The report briefly
mentions that mass migrations are expected as regions become uninhabitable.
"Children fare very poorly in these major population shifts," says Irwin
Redlener, director of the National Center for Disaster Preparedness at
Columbia University and president of the Children's Health Fund. "They're
more fragile medically and nutritionally," says Redlener, who wasn't involved
with the report. "They're less resilient, less likely to survive."
No matter what
the risks, the pediatrics academy shouldn't be sending its members out
to lobby, argues Janice Crouse, director of a think tank affiliated with
Concerned Women for America, a conservative public policy group. "Let them
issue a scientific report, and people can judge whether it has validity.
For a scientific
group to use children as a means of advancing a political agenda is beyond
the pale," she says.
Julie Gerberding,
director of the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, briefed
a Senate committee on the health risks of global warming last week. She
mentioned increasing asthma, malaria and waterborne diseases but not children's
vulnerability.
The Associated
Press reported that Gerberding's speech was "eviscerated" by the White
House, but CDC spokesman Tom Skinner denied it, adding that Gerberding
said everything she wanted to say without constraint.
"This is not
a political issue, it's a public health issue," Shea says. "If we know
the health of children and future children is threatened, we have an obligation
to act."
--
Copyright
2007 by United Press International.
All rights reserved.
--
