Pam Cruz. Peninsula 360 Press.
After the unprecedented fires registered in California during the year, and floods of catastrophic proportions in other U.S. states, Afro-descendant and Latino populations have been among the most affected.Many of them do not have the necessary resources to face such catastrophes.
This was pointed out during a video conference organized by Ethnic Media Servicessociologist and environmentalist Robert D. BullardThe climate change, he said, has been a determining factor in demonstrating that the U.S. continues to experience a situation of segregation.
The above, since so your skin color alone increases your chance of dying early by 15 percent. The company has been affected by the secondary effects of the environmental crisis in the world, such as the increase in carbon dioxide emissions due to the fires registered on the west coast of the country.
Likewise, households of African descent with incomes between $50,000 and $60,000 per year live in neighborhoods that are more polluted than Caucasian homes who earn less than $10,000 and their exposure to fine particles is 1.5 times higher.
In addition, 11.5 percent does not have insurance and 55 percent of that population lives in the southern states of the United States where Governors have advocated dismantling the Affordable Care Act. (ACA).
He further explained that government acts slowly to help people of African descent and Latinos in poverty, and that situations such as the COVID-19 pandemic, coupled with the effects of climate change, have increased this situation.
In this regard, he said that catastrophe support reaches less in hypersegregated neighborhoodsThe fact that they are the ones that commonly occupy these populations, which ends up causing many more health problems.
As of 2018, in 46 states in the U.S., people of African descent lived where the most pollution is recorded, so that breathe air that is up to 30 percent less quality and there are more than 200,000 early deaths per year among people of African descent, Latinos and the poor.
And it is that before this "climate racism" These sectors are the worst off, and if there is no improvement in climate policies, there will be a 6.0 percent drop in Gross Domestic Product, which translates into millions of dollars in losses in these areas. Equity is a requirement in action plans to achieve climate resilience.
For his part, the professor of the University of California Merced and climate change expert, LeRoy WesterlingHe indicated that the fires registered in the state will be increasingly common, so we will have to be prepared for the impact this will have on the health of the population.
This, he said, in addition to the fact that climate change has affected the rainy season and reduced its period, generating a dry environment conducive to fires, which in turn generate greater pollution and risks for the most vulnerable sectors of the population.
