Publication:
Impact of Climate Change in Health in Colombia and Recommendations for Mitigation and Adaptation

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2023-10-18
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2023-10-18
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Climate change has been called the most important threat to human health in the 21st century. It is estimated that if thetemperature rises and its impact on the other climatic variablescontinues unchanged, it will kill more than 83 million people (1 percent of the world’s population) in the next 80 years (Wattset al. 2020)—13 times the toll of the COVID-19 pandemic (WorldHealth Organization 2023). Historically, only pandemics or worldwars have posed such threats to human health. As a result,the issue has aroused unprecedented attention. In 2021, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared climate changethe greatest health threat facing humanity (WHO 2021). Now, more than 195 governments have included climate change mitigation and adaptation as pillars in their multi-year plans, and government health sectors have been developing plans tomeasure and respond to the impact of climate change on health. However, recognition of the links between climate change and health remains nascent, so these efforts have not yet been accompanied by strategic and actionable approaches to measure the impacts and ground the responses. This report contributes to addressing that gap by providing a framework for understandingthe impact of climate change on human health in Colombia and by outlining the most effective actions to mitigate the threat.
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World Bank. 2023. Impact of Climate Change in Health in Colombia and Recommendations for Mitigation and Adaptation. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/40494 License: CC BY-NC 3.0 IGO.
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