Climate change is spoiling food faster, making hundreds of millions of people sick around the world

By Yale Climate Connections, Sanket Jain
published 22 hours ago

The World Health Organization estimates 600 million people a year already suffer from foodborne illnesses.

Global warming has made it easier for bacteria and other germs to contaminate the food supply, and this little-discussed danger of climate change is teaching painful and sometimes life-threatening lessons to hundreds of millions of people every year. One of them is Sumitra Sutar, 75, of Haroli village in India's Maharashtra state.

Five years ago Sutar was eating leftover rice and lentil curry, her staple food for more than five decades. This time, her routine meal caused her to start vomiting "at least 15 times a day," she recalled recently. Eventually, she learned the culprit was a foodborne bacteria that produces toxins that can lead to vomiting, eye inflammation, and respiratory tract infections. Global warming has made the world more welcoming for the pathogen, Bacillus cereus, to grow in food stored after cooking. One study found that domestic rice cooking can be insufficient to inactivate its spores.

Researchers and health workers are sounding the alarm: The food supply is vulnerable to greater spoilage due to more frequent extreme heat, floods and droughts, boosting the risk of contamination and outbreaks of foodborne diseases. Extreme heat can hasten food spoilage by allowing bacteria to multiply faster, experts say. Rising waters from severe floods can contaminate crops with sewage or other unwanted waste products, while higher humidity can promote growth of salmonella bacteria on lettuce and other produce eaten raw. The World Health Organization estimates that 600 million people fall sick every year from foodborne diseases, leading to 420,000 deaths. Children under five years old are at especially high risk, and every year 125,000 children lose their lives because of such largely preventable diseases.

Many factors including farming practices and global food supply chains have made such problems much more prevalent, and a growing body of research has highlighted how climate change also plays a big role.

More:
https://www.livescience.com/health/viruses-infections-disease/climate-change-is-spoiling-food-faster-making-hundreds-of-millions-of-people-sick-around-the-world