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Prof Colin Butler(Austral ian Research

Council Future Fellow)

Anne Harding CentreDecember 9, 2014

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“The expense may be considerable, but the cost of doing nothing is incalculable”

Health in the Greenhouse

Editorial (Lancet, 1989)

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Outline

“Primary”, “secondary” and “tertiary” effects

Attributiontype I and type II errors

Food price rise

Conflict

Health-Earth (h-earth)

Acknowledgements

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“Tertiary”

“Primary”

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“Secondary”

Old location

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Super Typhoon Haiyan approaching the Philippines on Nov 7, 2013. Credit: EUMETSAT (Wide-angle satellite image)

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A year on, typhoon-devastated Philippine city fails to rebuild homes Date: 29-Oct-14Country: PHILIPPINES

Tacloban Mayor: <100 of 14,500 promised permanent homes built, (7m storm surges destroyed around 90% of city)

“The nephew of Imelda Marcos did not mention graft as factor in one of Asia's most corrupt countries”

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A woman, who survived the typhoon by climbing up a steep hill, stands beside her temporary home. “I’m scared living here. When the tide comes up here, I’m very nervous that my house will be destroyed,” she said. Photograph: Eleanor Farmer/Oxfam

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Attribution

type I and type II errors

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Trenberth, 2011:

Climate change attribution - null hypothesis: no human role

“science community much too conservative .. too many authors make Type II errors” (accept the null hypothesis in error) – ie conclude any particular extreme event has no anthropogenic (human) component”

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“Global warming is contributing to a changing incidence of extreme weather because the environment in which all storms form has changed from human activities”

WIREs Clim Change 2011, 2:925–9 30. doi: 10.1002/wcc.142

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Oreskes & Conway (2013):

“Western scientists built an intellectual culture based on the premise that it was worse to fool oneself into believing in something that did not exist than not to believe in something that did. Scientists referred to these positions as “type I” and “type II” errors, and established protocols designed to avoid type I errors at almost all costs”.

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Type 1 error spectrum Type 2

conservative?risky?precautionary? risky?

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oil price, speculation, rice panic

Extreme weather events (anthropogenic climate change contribution?)

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Extensive US droughts (2012-2013, Ca 2013-14)

– dryness and heat

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1989: Lancet editorial: foreshadows conflict

2011: Jarvis et al: "Climate change, ill health, and conflict." BMJ 342: 777-778.

2014: Stern, N. “Climate change is here now and it could lead to global conflict.” The Guardian

Conflict and climate change

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Waterscarcity

Regions afflicted by problems due to environmental stresses: • population pressure • water shortage• climate change affecting crops • sea level rise • pre-existing hunger• armed conflict, current/recent

From UK Ministry of Defence

[May RM, 2007 Lowy Institute Lecture]

Climate Change: Multiplier of Conflicts and Regional Tensions

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Type 2 errors:

Conclude 100% random, zero anthropogenic contribution to:

heatwaves

heavy rain/floods

severe storms

Conclude 100% social, zero eco (environmental) causation

famine

migration

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Burden of Disease (proportion)

Year widely accepted

now 2050?

PRIMARY (eg heat, injury, productivity)

SECONDARY (e.g. vector-borne diseases, air pollution, allergies)

TERTIARY: (a “systemic multiplier”) famine, conflict, large-

scale migration, economic collapse

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9 universities, 6 countries, 1 UNCanberra, Aust

Liverpool, UKOulu, Finland

Massey, NZSan Diego, US

Strathclyde, UKUNU Int’l Inst Glob Health

Victoria, CanadaWashington, US

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Wael Al-Delaimy, San Diego, USHarry Burns - Strathclyde, UK

Colin Butler, Canberra, AustTony Capon, UNU Int’l Inst Glob Health

Kris Ebi, Washington, USTrevor Hancock, Victoria, Canada

Jouni Jaakola, Oulu, FinlandAndy Morse, Liverpool, UK

John Potter - Massey, New Zealand

co-founders

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Al-Delaimy (envtl epi, GH, ISEE)Burns (PH, GH – former CMO Scotland)Butler (eco-envtl epi, MEA, IPCC, NGO)Capon, (PH, director UNU II Glob Health

Ebi (envtl epi, IPCC – former chair WG II)Hancock, (PH – 1st leader Canadian Green Party)Jaakola (envtl epi, ISEE, WHO collab cent GEC)

Morse (climatologist, Infection & GH)Potter (cancer epi, fmr director Fred Hutchison)

co-founders: expertise

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H-earth

engaged – advocacy

Research & research training

teaching

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Health for all on a single planet

idealisticbroad

emerging

Where Earth system science meets planetary social science &

health 22

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Toxicity

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Placebo

Vaccine spectrum

Towards a solution

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Panic, despair, or indifference

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“Polyanna”

“Social vaccine” spectrum

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All contributors, CABI staff, Rachel Cutts

Tony McMichael, Paul Epstein

H-earth: Ro McFarlane, Rachel Davey, Maggie Jamieson

Susan Woldenberg Butler

Thank you

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