The warmer weather is a lifeline

With declining temperatures and the return of rain clouds, millions of British holidaymakers will remember the summer of 2018.

While most British and visitors alike -mer have enjoyed the strong sunshine in recent weeks, some worry that it may have been caused by climate change and could therefore be a recurring feature of the British summers.

After all, we are living in a period of global warming and global temperatures are now about 1 degree Celsius

Last week, the chief scientist of the Met Office, Professor Stephen Belcher, explained on BBC Newsnight that the causes of the recent heat wave were a combination of short-term weather conditions and long-term climatic factors. When asked if the current summer temperatures were the "new normal," he said, "The heat wave we've probably been part of natural cycles, but it's superimposed on this global warming context, and that's Is what raises our temperatures.

I think it's about right, even though Professor Belcher and I might disagree on the rate of global warming. I accept the basics of climate science, but I have long criticized alarmist hyperbole and climate warnings. I believe that climate change is real and that our CO2 emissions contribute to it, although it is difficult to quantify the extent to which climate change is natural and how much is produced by man. However, the current trend of global warming over the past 30 years has been much slower than most climate scientists predicted. This gives us more time to find better ways to adapt and adapt to a world that is warming up slightly.

Professor Sir Brian Hoskins, a member of the Climate Change Commission, also acknowledged some scientific uncertainties about the role of climate change in the recent heat wave, saying, "We have seen sustained models hot and dry . What we do not understand right now is if climate change makes these models more likely.

More important than these open questions, the fact is that the warmer temperatures in the United Kingdom will probably have beneficial effects on health. Cold-related deaths account for 20 times more deaths in the United Kingdom (61 per 100,000 per year) than heat-related deaths (3 per 100,000 per year). The heatwave of 2018 is expected to cause an additional 1,000 deaths, but each winter there are between 20,000 and 30,000 additional deaths in the United Kingdom. With warmer winter temperatures, this number will decrease.

Some of the leading British medical experts have calculated that an increase in average temperature of one degree Celsius over the next 40 years would increase about 2,000 heat-related deaths in Britain. . but would reduce cold-related deaths by almost 20,000, ten times more. And of course, we can adapt to warmer summers. In countries like Spain and the United States, where the use of air conditioning has become the norm, heat-related deaths have declined significantly in recent decades despite global warming. We can do the same thing, enjoy the warmer summers and enjoy the milder winters too.