The Palpable Freakish Irony of Covid-19 and Climate Change
Climate Change Drawdown — 1: Covid-19 — 0
U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Jerome Adams warned today that the Covid outbreak will worsen this week and said that people across the country are not taking the threat seriously enough.
Take a quote from any climate scientist and insert “climate change” instead of “Covid outbreak”
“I want America to understand …, it’s going to get bad,” Adams said in an interview on the “TODAY” show.
“The disease is spreading, he said, because many people… are not abiding by guidance to stay at home and practice social distancing. “Right now, there are not enough people out there who are taking this seriously. Everyone needs to act as if they have the virus right now,” Adams continued.
Adams’ warnings mirror statements from the National Climate Assessment, NASA, NOAA, the IPCC in reference to taking steps to mitigate climate change. People are not abiding by guidance from these organizations and taking it seriously. Everyone needs to understand, and the signs are abundantly clear, that a climate emergency is happening right now.
The Covid outbreak as we know it could kill millions of Americans unless we flatten out the curve. It is a disease that quickly mutates, dissolves lung tissue and has no cure or vaccine, according to the experts.
Climate change, on the other hand, will take centuries to stop, have a longer duration, is a time bomb and will be more costly to the U.S. economy, in the realm of trillions of dollars a year. Yet most of us continue to ignore the warnings and the signs all around us. But that is not the only freakish irony here.
Covid Slows Greenhouse Gases
It so happens that since this pandemic began, the imploding economy has resulted in fewer emissions going into the atmosphere. So much fewer, in fact, that they are measurable from space. The silver lining of a global pandemic like Covid-19 is that the abrupt reversal of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. On March 5th, NASA reported that satellite photos confirmed decreases in nitrogen dioxide (NO2), which is a greenhouse gas, along with carbon dioxide and methane, that was measured over China.
The current global CO2 concentration has dropped from a recent high of over 415 parts per million (ppm) to 413.75, according to the Scripps Observatory. Any climate scientist will tell you that this is not a significant drop, let alone a necessarily valid change, but it is a step in the right direction. We still have a long way to go to get the CO2 concentration back down to a safe level of 350 ppm. And we don’t hear any of our leaders saying that during their isolation they have come to the conclusion that we need to draw down greenhouse gases. But there is another connection between Covid and climate change.
The Dystopian Future Includes Pandemics
The IPCC and NCA have long predicted global warming would result in increased threats of pandemics along with all of the other impacts that we are already seeing. These include superstorms, mega-fires, floods, infrastructure destruction, refugee displacement, melting ice, and rising seas to name a few. The fact that global warming is a threat multiplier for pandemics was a distant, unknown impact until now. Now we know exactly what a pandemic means, the consequences for our culture, our economy, and ultimately our survival.
Will people realize that more of these are something we need to avoid at any cost? If so, will people vote for candidates who will take a hard line on reducing fossil fuel use and bolstering renewable energy? It may be too late for that in the presidential race since our two leading candidates both support oil and gas pipelines and business as usual. It may be a lost cause in the U.S. Senate until we establish term limits and break the continued corporate welfare paradigm. There is hope that people like us will learn from drawdown and make personal choices, and vote for the environment and reverse GHGs.
But don’t get your hopes up. Neither Covid-19 or climate change are going away any time soon. But while we engage in social distancing it is possible to engage in political networking and activism. If you are so inclined, call or email your elected official at Senate.gov. They might not be easy to find but they are easy to track down online. Give them a piece of your mind.
