Some Deaths are More Fashionable than Others
According to statistics from the emergency disasters database, deaths caused by flooding, droughts, heat waves and storms — including the effects of global warming — now account for about one-twentieth of one percent of all deaths in the developing world.
By contrast, lack of access to clean drinking water and sanitation kills almost three million annually. Almost two million people, meanwhile, die each year inhaling smoke from inefficient and dirty fuels such as dried animal dung, crop residues and wood. Another one million die from the effects of outdoor air pollution.
This means that for every global warming-related death, at least 210 people die each year from old-fashioned air and water pollution.
Editorial on increased number of deaths from air and water pollution in the Wall Street Journal.
The problems in the developing world seem to only matter when they are politically expedient. It’s terrbile that problems that are easily and quickly solved in developed countries are left to fester in these places.
But Global Warming is so much more abstract! Haven’t you been to a museum of modern art?
Reminds me of the cholera epidemic in Haiti. Unfortunate and ironic that it was caused by UN peacekeepers. Sanitation is the single most effective public health measure.
Good point, Alex. I would add that corruption often inhibits the initiation of development projects that would create cleaner sanitation facilities.
Americans almost take it for granted that it is normal to die in the hospital after a long life. But, that is not how it is in much of the world. Throughout history — and in many developing countries — few people make it to old age. It is common for people often die of trivial illness, of malnutrition, of dysentery. Some of the greatest public health triumphs of the 20th Century include clean drinking water, sanitation and food safety. Childhood immunization was another. In the poorest countries, half of kids never make it to their 5th birthday. The cause is often dysentery, food or water borne-illness and childhood illnesses.
I’m confused about what the argument being made here is. Most conservatives I know seem to want less spending on global health initiatives that would address a lot of the problems John mentioned above. Indeed, public health interventions such as sanitation and clean water are responsible for the vast majority of the gains in life expectancy that developed countries have experienced. I agree these should be vital global health priorities, since there are still too many people who lack these basic necessities (and the free market doesn’t seem to have any interest in providing them).
As for the global-warming related deaths, I assume John’s just being snarky here, but he’s missing the point. Regardless of how many deaths have happened now (I would argue that even 1/20 of 1% is still too many), global warming as a public health problem is more a concern for the future than the immediate present. I assume this may not be persuasive to a global warming denier, but if one denies that global warming is a problem then I guess we will never see eye-to-eye on this.
@Eric is correct. Those who live on a dollar a day or so aren’t very attractive to private business. Water sanitation was a problem in America until the 70s, when that evil EPA came along and made safe drinking water a legal requirement.
Based on what measure? In the Tammy Tengs’ NCPA policy report (late 1990s), she outlined the cost per life-year saved for a variety of interventions. Depending on the intervention, each potential year of life saved came at a different cost. Since resources are finite, a reasonable society has to decide which interventions are worth pursuing, and which are not. It makes sense to go after the low-hanging fruit rather than tackle problems that kill far fewer people and cost far more to mitigate. Since water-borne illness and sanitation are far less costly and a much bigger problem, it makes sense to expend resources on these problems.