Bhavisha Madaan
23rd November 2020
Climate change a much bigger threat than the coronavirus (Source: News 18)
According to the Red Cross, the world ought to react with an equivalent urgency to global climate change like it is doing to the coronavirus crisis and that warming poses a larger threat than COVID-19. Even while the pandemic goes on, global climate change isn't taking a clear stop from wreaking disturbance, the International Federation of Red Cross Crescent Societies (IFRC) said during a report.
In its report on world catastrophes since the Nineteen Sixties, the Geneva-based organisation noticed that one hundred disasters had hit the planet- several of them climate related-since the World Health Organisation declared the pandemic in March.
And while it's progressively possible that one or many vaccines will soon be available against COVID-19, IFRC Secretary-General Jagan Chapagain stressed that "unfortunately, there's no vaccine for climate change."
"More than five crore folks have been affected. It's a very, very serious crisis the planet is facing currently", Chapagain said in relation to the pandemic, that has already claimed more than 13 lakh lives.
"Of course, the COVID is there; it's in front of us, it's affecting our families, our friends, our relatives," the IFRC Secretary-General said during a virtual news conference. However, he warned that IFRC expected a significant medium and long-term impact on human life and earth due to drastic changes in the climate.
The frequency and intensity of extreme weather and climate-related events have been steadily increasing since the 1906s, according to the report. In the year 2019 alone, 308 natural disasters hit the earth- 77 per cent of which were climate or weather-related and caused around 24,400 casualties.
Over 4,10,000 people have fallen prey to weather and climate-related disasters, most of them in more impoverished and under-developed countries, with heatwaves and storms proving the deadliest, according to a study. When it comes to global warming, it'll require a lot of sustained action and investment to shield human life on this earth.
The number of climate and weather-related disasters has surged by nearly 35 per cent since the 1990s, IFRC said, calling it a 'deadly development'.
Faced with this threat, that 'literally threatens our long survival', IFRC encouraged the international community to act with the urgency needed.
Investing in resilience within the most vulnerable paces is more economical than to simply accept what is happening. Red Cross plans on an increase within the cost of humanitarian response and hopes to contribute to a safer, prosperous and sustainable world for everybody.
(Sources: NDTV, Republic World, The Hindu, Deccan Herald)
Edited by: Suditi Jha