Impacts of Climate Change on Inequities in Child Health

Children

Charmian M. Bennett²  Sharon Friel¹ 

[1] Regulatory Institutions Network, Australian National University, Acton ACT 0200, Australia; E-Mail:;National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, Australian National University, Acton ACT 0200, Australia

关键词: child health;    health inequity;    climate change;    social determinants;    vulnerability;    under-nutrition;    poverty;    vector-borne disease;    heat stress;    extreme weather events;   

DOI  :  10.3390/children1030461

来源: mdpi

【 摘 要 】

This paper addresses an often overlooked aspect of climate change impacts on child health: the amplification of existing child health inequities by climate change. Although the effects of climate change on child health will likely be negative, the distribution of these impacts across populations will be uneven. The burden of climate change-related ill-health will fall heavily on the world’s poorest and socially-disadvantaged children, who already have poor survival rates and low life expectancies due to issues including poverty, endemic disease, undernutrition, inadequate living conditions and socio-economic disadvantage. Climate change will exacerbate these existing inequities to disproportionately affect disadvantaged children. We discuss heat stress, extreme weather events, vector-borne diseases and undernutrition as exemplars of the complex interactions between climate change and inequities in child health.

【 授权许可】

CC BY   
© 2014 by the authors; licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.