People with disabilities are disproportionately affected by disasters, which are worsening and increasing because of climate change. The National Council on Disability estimated that a “disproportionate number of the fatalities” amid Hurricane Katrina were people with disabilities. Typical evacuation routes and disaster plans are often not accessible to this vulnerable group, while interruptions to electricity are deadlier for those who require machines to treat medical conditions.
And it isn’t just disasters like fires, superstorms, and floods. Extreme heat, which up to 75 percent of humanity may be at risk of experiencing by 2100, has adverse physical and mental health effects in healthy individuals. But people with neurological conditions who cannot sweat or regulate body temperature are even more vulnerable to extreme heat.
And those are just a few examples.
The Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change’s report released late last year identified poor—and those with disabilities of any kind are more likely to be poor than able-bodied people—and vulnerable (including those with health or physical conditions) people as those who will be affected first and hardest by a 1.5 degree Celsius rise in global temperature.
[For more on this story by Megan Wildhood, go to https://www.yesmagazine.org/pl...isabilities-20190124]
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