environment: allergies asthma extreme weather pollen
by Warren
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Year 2, Month 3, Day 3: A Cashew? A Tissue? A Fichu?
The Sonoma County Press-Democrat reprints a story from the LA times on the likelihood of an increase in asthma from global warming (hotter, wetter weather equals more pollenaceous plants).
Sent February 22:
A person racked by sneezes and coughs, eyes and nose streaming, is a convenient figure of fun for those who don’t suffer from allergies. Global climate change’s effect on the atmospheric pollen count has similar humorous potential — as long as we avoid looking at the ways in which all of us are affected. And it’s not just asthma and allergies. As planetary warming changes our environment in unpredictable ways over the next decades, we can anticipate some of its effects: hotter temperatures will help spread tropical diseases; unpredictable and extreme weather may destroy local infrastructure (impassable roads, unsafe drinking water, rolling blackouts); agriculture will suffer (and food will get more expensive). Any of these by itself is a mere inconvenience. Collectively they are the localized face of a threat that’s planetary in scope, existential in nature. Environmentalists seek to limit the damage; Republican politicians, by contrast, are investing heavily in antihistamines.
Warren Senders
The title references Ogden Nash’s poem “Allergy in a Country Churchyard.”
environment: allergies poison ivy pollen sneezing
by Warren
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Month 4, Day 16: Aaaaaaahhhh-choooo!
A Siegel is a prolific writer on climate issues at Kos. Yesterday’s piece was about the impact of climate change on pollen levels, and hence the future of allergic reactions….kind of scary.
Sent to my local paper, the Medford Transcript.
The effects of global warming are no longer abstract. You’re going to be feeling them in your nose. Increased CO2 levels are projected to boost pollen production enormously over the coming decades, according to a National Wildlife Federation study released yesterday. A doubling or tripling of ragweed allergens in the United States is going to have huge economic impacts. We already lose around $12 billion dollars a year to hay fever suffering; we lose over 14 million school and work days, over $15 billion in medical costs and over $5 billion in lost earnings a year to asthma. What will the Global Warming multiplier be?
But wait! There’s more! Fungal production will probably quadruple with doubled CO2 levels; tree pollen levels are expected to increase drastically — and did I mention that poison ivy will be faster-growing and more virulent?
But it’s not all bad news. Investing in pharmaceutical companies should be a winning strategy. As asthma and allergies debilitate huge segments of the population, we can sneeze all the way to the bank.
Warren Senders