Slashdot - Dangerous temperatures could kill 50% more people in Europe
by the end of the century, a study has found, with the lives lost to
stronger heat projected to outnumber those saved from milder cold. From a
report: The researchers estimated an extra 8,000 people would die
each year as a result of "suboptimal temperatures" even under the most
optimistic scenario for cutting planet-heating pollution. The hottest
plausible scenario they considered showed a net increase of 80,000
temperature-related deaths a year.
The findings
challenge an argument popular among those who say global heating is
good for society because fewer people will die from cold weather. "We
wanted to test this," said Pierre Masselot, a statistician at the London
School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine and lead author of the study.
"And we show clearly that we will see a net increase in
temperature-related deaths under climate change." The study builds on
previous research in which the scientists linked temperature to
mortality rates for different age groups in 854 cities across Europe.
They combined these with three climate scenarios that map possible
changes in population structure and temperature over the century.
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