Climate change can cause complex diseases: experts

LAHORE: Varied and intense climate change patterns can cause irregular devastating events in the country, including floods, heat wave, droughts, deforestation, storms, de-gradation of air quality and worsening situation of food.

Experts believe that all these changes can cause various complex diseases.

Extreme weather conditions like rising temperatures, sudden heat wave and irregular pattern of rains are main factors behind spread of such diseases, they say.

The major socio-communal areas being affected by climate change include human health, civic services, water-related infrastructure and hydropower generation.

These special conditions have created a global inter-dependence, which has imbalanced the nexus among the factors, including water, food and energy supplies to the communities around the globe.

Talking to APP, Punjab Environment Protection Department (PEPD) Deputy Director Misbah-ul-Haq Khan Lodhi said that in Pakistan, increasing hot climate, changing patterns of snowmelt, rise in sea level and precipitation are exerting enormous impact on natural resources.

Misbah said that global warming and climate change issues were causing fast glacial melting in Pakistan's Northern Areas which, he added, could cause a 60 percent shortage in water, affecting energy and agriculture security.

According to the 2018 Global Climate Risk Index report, released by the public policy group, Germanwatch, Pakistan is amongst the top 10 countries affected the most by climate change.

Renowned Environmentalist Dr Mehmood Khalid Qamar said that environmental hazards were seriously affecting Pakistan's deltaic area, which is likely to expose more than 2.5 million people to water scarcity, rising sea level effects and food insecurity.