133 Ben Beard - How Global Warming Is Making Some Diseases Even Scarier

Americans should expect a surge in deaths from heat waves, flooding,and respiratory disease as the climate warms, according to awide-ranging White House reportreleased last month. And what spells disaster for humans could also be aboon to infectious microbes and the animals that transmit them.

The guest on this week’s episode is Ben Beard,associate director for climate change at the Centers for DiseaseControl and Prevention. He’s one of more than 100 researchers whocontributed to the report, and his specialty is vector-borne diseases.These illnesses—which include Lyme disease, dengue fever, and Zikavirus—are transmitted by other animals, especially insects such asmosquitos and ticks. Beard talks to Indre about howglobal warming is poised to alter their spread and whether the changeswe’re already seeing can be attributed to climate change. 

You can find the table of vector-borne diseases here: https://s3.amazonaws.com/healthreport/Health_Ch00_ExecutiveSummary_PublicDraft_April_7_2015.pdf

Here’s more info about Lyme disease: http://www.cdc.gov/lyme/