When the Well Runs Dry: Climate Change, Water and Human Health

Abstract:

Water is a critical pathway between changes in climate and impacts on human health. Increased intensity of the hydrologic cycle can impair water quality through both drought and runoff associated with extreme precipitation events. Local changes or extremes in hydrological cycles can also alter the life cycles of moquitoes, ticks, snails, and other carriers of human diseases. These impacts in turn can affect the transmission of malaria, schistosomiasis, and many other human diseases. Warmer freshwater and coastal waters, in combination with other factors like fertilizer runoff and salinity, are also associated with proliferation of a variety of human pathogens, including cyanobacteria and vibrio species.

This presentation will highlight the many linkages between climate change, water and human health. It will review recent findings of the US National Climate Assessment and 5^th Assessment Report of the IPCC with regards to water-related threats to health, and discuss approaches to modeling health outcomes of water-associated climate change impacts.