Sheffield PE and Landrigan PJ

Environmental Health Perspectives

Published date March 1, 2011

Global climate change and children's health: threats and strategies for prevention

  • Reviews projected impacts of climate change on children's health, the pathways involved in these effects, and prevention strategies
  • Assesses primary studies, review articles, and organizational reports
  • Finds that in the year 2000 climate change was responsible for > 150,000 deaths worldwide and that 88 percent of the disease burden fell on children
  • States that documented health effects include changing ranges of vector-borne diseases such as malaria and dengue; increased diarrheal and respiratory disease; increased morbidity and mortality from extreme weather; changed exposures to toxic chemicals; worsened poverty; food and physical insecurity; and threats to human habitation