Climate Change - GHealth News

Aug42025 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

World Court climate opinion turns up the legal heat on governments

Climate Change

GHealth News - A landmark opinion delivered by the United Nations' highest court last week that governments must protect the climate is already being cited in courtrooms, as lawyers say it strengthens the legal arguments in suits against countries and companies. The International Court of Justice, also known as the World Court, laid out the duty of states to limit harm from greenhouse gases and to regulate private industry. It said failure to reduce emissions could be an internationally wrongful act and, found that treaties such as the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change should be considered legally binding. While not specifically naming the United States, the court said countries that were not part of the United Nations climate treaty must still protect the climate a...

Feb282025 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

WHO and Swiss TPH Release Updated 2025 Air Quality Standards Database

Climate Change

GHealth News - The World Health Organization (WHO), in partnership with the Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute (Swiss TPH), has launched the updated 2025 Air Quality Standards database. This comprehensive resource consolidates national air quality standards for key pollutants and airborne toxins from countries worldwide. The latest update highlights global progress in aligning with WHO’s air quality guidelines, with a 17% increase in countries implementing standards for harmful pollutants. "The updated WHO Air Quality Standards database is an essential tool that showcases global advancements in air quality regulations aimed at safeguarding public health," said Dr. Maria Neira, Director of Environment, Climate Change, and Health at WHO. "It provides crucial data for evidence-base...

Nov262024 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

Developing Nations Criticize $300B Deal at COP29 Climate Summit

Climate Change

The world approved a bitterly negotiated climate deal Sunday but poorer nations most at the mercy of worsening disasters dismissed a $300 billion a year pledge from wealthy historic polluters as insultingly low. After two exhausting weeks of chaotic bargaining and sleepless nights, nearly 200 nations banged through the contentious finance pact in the early hours in a sports stadium in Azerbaijan. But the applause had barely subsided when India delivered a full-throated rejection of the “abysmally poor” dollar-figure just agreed. “It’s a paltry sum,” thundered India’s delegate Chandni Raina. “This document is little more than an optical illusion. This, in our opinion, will not address the enormity of the challenge we all face.” Sierra Leone’s climate minister Jiwoh Abdulai, w...

Mar212024 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

U.N. Weather Agency Issues ‘Red Alert’ on Climate Change

Climate Change

GHealth News - The U.N. weather agency is sounding a “red alert” about global warming, citing record-smashing increases last year in greenhouse gases, land and water temperatures and melting of glaciers and sea ice, and is warning that the world's efforts to reverse the trend have been inadequate. The World Meteorological Organization said there is a “high probability” that 2024 will be another record-hot year. The Geneva-based agency, in a “State of the Global Climate” report released Tuesday, ratcheted up concerns that a much-vaunted climate goal is increasingly in jeopardy: That the world can unite to limit planetary warming to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) from pre-industrial levels. “Never have we been so close – albeit on a temporary basis at the ...

Jan72024 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

How global warming affects our well-being

Climate Change

By: Barton Goldsmith Climate change is not just an environmental issue; it has a profound impact on our emotional well-being. From eco-anxiety to despair, climate change can drive an array of emotional consequences. Climate change, driven by rising global temperatures and extreme weather events, is not confined to its physical manifestations. Its effects extend into the emotional realm, influencing how individuals feel and respond to the world around them. Understanding these emotional responses is crucial for addressing the emotional well-being of communities and individuals. Climate change is often associated with the rise of eco-anxiety, a form of chronic worry and fear about the future of the planet. Researchers like Clayton (2012) have examined how concerns about climate chan...

Oct72023 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

Weather disasters caused by climate change displaced 43 million children, says UNICEF

Climate Change

GHealth News - In a sweeping report on the issue, the United Nations agency detailed the heart-wrenching stories of some of the children affected, and co-author Laura Healy told AFP the data only revealed the "tip of the iceberg," with many more likely affected. "We moved our belongings to the highway, where we lived for weeks," recounts Sudanese child Khalid Abdul Azim, whose flooded village was only accessible by boat. In 2017, sisters Mia and Maia Bravo watched flames engulf their trailer in California from the back of the family minivan. "I was afraid, in shock," Maia says in the report. "I would stay up all night." Statistics on internal displacements caused by climate disasters generally do not account for the age of the victims. But UNICEF worked w...

Jul212023 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

Global health leaders urge climate-friendly health care systems

Climate Change

By: Tony Capon Health leaders from the world’s biggest nations have expressed their concern about the rising impact of emissions from health care, but more urgent calls for change came from health and climate experts on the margins of the G7 Health Ministers summit. Health Ministers from Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States met in Nagaski, committing to working together across three primary areas: global health architecture, universal health coverage, and health innovation. On global health architecture, their focus was on learning lessons from the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, and support for the negotiation of a new instrument under the World Health Organization constitution to strengthen pa...

Dec172022 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

Chile heat wave exacerbates forest fires, causes public health risk

Climate Change

A helicopter assists as a wildfire burns parts of the rural areas around Curacavi town outside Santiago, Chile, December 15, 2022. REUTERS/Ivan Alvarado GHealth News - A heat wave that has hit Chile this week with record temperatures in some areas and a lack of rainfall has intensified forest fires that have already burned more than 7,000 hectares (17,000 acres)in the South American nation. Dozens of people have had to evacuate their homes because of the fires and the capital Santiago is under a public health alert due to a cloud of smoke, officials said on Friday. The state-owned National Forestry Corporation (Conaf) said firefighters were currently tackling 18 fires concentrated in the country's central regions, as well as a smaller number in the south. Among several localiti...

Nov12022 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

WHO and WMO launch a new knowledge platform for climate and health

Climate Change

The first global knowledge platform dedicated to climate and health - climahealth.info – was launched today by the Joint Office of the World Health Organization (WHO) and World Meteorological Organization (WMO), with support from the Wellcome Trust. It is in response to growing calls for actionable information to protect people from the health risks of climate change and other environmental hazards. Climate and health are inextricably linked. Climate change, extreme weather events and environmental degradation have fundamental impact on human health and well-being. More people than ever before are exposed to increased climate-related health risks, from poor water and air quality to infectious diseases and heat stress. "Climate change is killing people right now,” said Diarm...

Aug202022 by GHealth NewsNo Comments

Egypt to launch award for confronting climate change in Africa

Climate Change

Sharm El-Sheikh Ghealth News - Egypt’s Minister of Environment Yasmine Fouad attended the signing of a trilateral MoU between the ministry’s Egyptian Environmental Affairs Agency (EEAA), the Industrial Modernisation Centre (IMC), and the Association for Sustainable Quality of Living (Estidama) to launch the award, the ministry said in a statement on Thursday. The award is meant to encourage sectors and stakeholders to follow an ecofriendly approach and mitigate the effects of climate change, the ministry noted. It will also encourage stakeholders to apply innovation-based initiatives in science and technology to support the measures to combat climate change and achieve the sustainable development goals, the ministry added. The award will be presented to the winners during the C...