Read the full post at Brink.
There has been a lot written about what climate change and COVID-19 have in common. They both present huge risks to life on our planet and to our economic prosperity. They affect every country, albeit to varying degrees, and they both are causing the greatest harm to the poorest in society, who can least afford the additional suffering.
But there is one critical difference: The human and economic tolls from today’s climate change-linked natural disasters have not yet risen to the level of the current pandemic, which has resulted in millions of deaths, faltering economies and overwhelmed health care systems. As a result, our response to rising global temperatures has lacked the kind of urgency that pushed governments and the scientific community to develop not one, but several vaccines only a year after the first case of COVID-19 was diagnosed.