Chapter 24: Asia
24.4.6.2.1. Floods and health
Epidemics have been reported after floods and storms (Bagchi, 2007) as a result of decreased drinking water quality (Harris et al., 2008;Hashizume et al., 2008; Solberg, 2010; Kazama et al., 2012), mosquito proliferation (Pawar et al., 2008), and exposure to rodent-borne pathogens(Kawaguchi et al., 2008; Zhou et al., 2011) and the intermediate snail hosts of Schistosoma (Wu et al., 2008).
Contaminated urban flood waters have caused exposure to pathogens and toxic compounds, for example, in India and Pakistan (Sohan et al., 2008;Warraich et al., 2011).
Mental disorders and posttraumatic stress syndrome have also been observed in disaster-prone areas (Udomratn, 2008) and, in India, have been linked to age and gender (Telles et al., 2009). See also Section 11.4.2 for flood-attributable deaths.
24.4.6.4. Vulnerabilities to Key Drivers
Key vulnerabilities vary widely within the region. Climate change can exacerbate current socioeconomic and political disparities and add to the vulnerability of Southeast Asia and Central Asia to security threats that may be transnational in nature (Jasparro and Taylor, 2008; Lioubimtseva and Henebry, 2009). Apart from detrimental impacts of extreme events, vulnerability of livelihoods in agrarian communities also arisesfrom geographicsettings,demographictrends,socioeconomicfactors, access to resources and markets, unsustainable water consumption, farming practices, and lack of adaptive capacity (Acosta-Michlik and Espaldon, 2008;Allison et al., 2009; Byg and Salick, 2009; Lioubimtseva and Henebry, 2009; Salick and Ross, 2009; Salick et al., 2009; UN DESA Statistics Division, 2009; Xu et al., 2009; Knox et al., 2011; Mulligan et al., 2011). Urban wage laborers were found to be more vulnerable to cost of living related poverty impacts of climate change than those who directly depend on agriculture for their livelihoods (Hertel et al., 2010). In Indonesia, drought-associated fires increase vulnerability of agriculture, forestry, and human settlements, particularly in peatland areas(Murdiyarso and Lebel, 2007). Human health is also a major area of focus for Asia (Munslowand O’Dempsey, 2010),where the magnitude and type of health effects from climate change depend on differences in socioeconomic and demographic factors, health systems, the natural and built environment, land use changes, and migration, in relation to local resilience and adaptive capacity. The role of institutions is also critical, particularly in influencing vulnerabilities arising from gender (Ahmed and Fajber, 2009),caste and ethnic differences (Jones and Boyd, 2011), and securing climate-sensitive livelihoods in rural areas (Agrawal and Perrin, 2008).
