Climate Change and Human Health Impacts in the United States: An Update on the Results of the U.S. National Assessment

Ebi, Kristie L.; Mills, David M.; Smith, Joel B.; Grambsch, Anne

That the new literature does not identify a change in the range of climate-sensitive health outcomes should not be surprising. The selected health outcomes have long been the focus of epidemiologic research in the United States, with associations between changes in weather factors and increased morbidity and mortality relatively well described. However, data gaps still exist that, until resolved, will limit the ability of any assessment to provide a definitive conclusion about the net health impact of climate variability and change in the United States. Perhaps most important, the continued lack of reliable local and regional climate change projections limits the ability of researchers to quantify the attributable burden of diseases due to climate change. At the same time, quantifying by how much adaptive capacity is likely to reduce impacts also is uncertain. Until reliable quantitative estimates of both impacts and adaptive capacity are developed, the net impacts of climate change on human health will inevitably be described as uncertain.