While the current coronavirus pandemic has disrupted human lives to an unsettling amount, it still doesn’t level up to the dangers posed by global warming and rapidly changing climate. Recently a Red Cross report stated that climate change needs much urgent attention than COVID-19 as it poses a great threat to the entire planet.
The organization urged humanity to react with the same urgency, even more urgently, to climate change as it has to the pandemic; while stating that global warming is a much bigger threat than COVID-19.
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said in a report that even as the pandemic continues, climate change is not stopping to affect the planet. In its report on global catastrophes since the 1960s, the Geneva-based organization noted that over 100 calamities have befallen the world, since the World Health Organization declared the pandemic in March – many of which were climate-related.
A Red Cross reports emphasizes that climate change requires urgent attention, more than COVID-19 | Image: Noah Berger/AP
Over 50 million people had been affected by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, which has taken the lives of more than 1.3 million people, worldwide.
Of course, the COVID is there, it’s in front of us, it is affecting our families, our friends, our relatives. It’s a very, very serious crisis the world is facing currently.
Said IFRC Secretary-General Jagan Chapagain.
While many vaccine candidates are under trials and one of them is likely to soon become accessible against COVID-19, the IFRC emphasized that there is no cure for climate change. It will have a more substantial medium and long-term influence on human life and on the planet.
According to the IFRC, the regularity and intensity of extreme weather and climate-linked events have been gradually escalating since the 1960s. Last year alone, the world had to undergo 308 natural calamities – 77 percent of them are climate or weather-related – killing around 24,400 people.
Not only humans but entire ecosystems are threatened by climate change | Image: Yevgeny Sofroneyev / TASS
The frequency and number of such disasters have increased by nearly 35 percent since the 1990s, which IRFC has labeled a “deadly development.” These calamities have killed over 410,000 people in the past decade; and mostly poorer countries had to bear the brunt of such occurrences with heatwaves and storms taking many lives.
The report pointed out that these threats literally jeopardize the survival of life on the planet, and the international community must act with the requisite urgency.
These disasters are already on the doorstep in every country around the world. With challenges like these, international solidarity is not only a moral responsibility but also the smart thing to do…Investing in resilience in the most vulnerable places is more cost-effective than to accept continued increases in the cost of humanitarian response, and contributes to a safer, more prosperous and sustainable world for everyone.
The report said.
The organization projected that over $50 billion would be required yearly over the next decade to help 50 developing countries adjust to the changing climatic patterns. It emphasized that the amount was “dwarfed by the global response to the economic impact of COVID-19,” which has now surpassed $10 trillion.
It was also noted in the report that much of the money invested in climate change prevention and mitigation was not reaching the developing countries, which are threatened most by these changes. While many communities are working hard toward climate change prevention, it has become imperative to protect the people who are most vulnerable to these changes.