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Jeremy Farrar, the World Health Organization’s chief scientist, has warned that climate change will result in the infectious disease dengue becoming endemic in parts of Europe and the United States, in an opening interview at the POLITICO Health Summit.
The mosquitoes that transmit the virus like warm, damp climates and have already been spreading more into Europe this summer, he said.
With countries warming year on year, “dengue is going to become endemic, certainly in the United States and in parts of Europe,” he said.
This will have a significant impact on Europe’s health systems, he warned. Each child needs intense care when they are hospitalized with dengue, he said. “That’s going to overwhelm our health systems.”
Farrar is driving the discourse on the need to reframe the risks of climate change on our health.
“I don’t think we’ve made the case that climate is a health issue any way strongly enough,” he said.
“We have not made the case for climate as a health issue. We’ve not made the case that this is actually the last opportunity of a century,” he said, adding: “We need to change the narrative.”
