The impacts of climate change on human health are often underestimated or perceived to be in a distant future. Here, we present the projected impacts of climate change in the context of COVID-19, a recent human health catastrophe. We compared projected heat mortality with COVID-19 deaths in 38 cities worldwide and found that in half of these cities, heat-related deaths could exceed annual COVID-19 deaths in les...
Objective: To examine the associations between characteristics of daily rainfall (intensity, duration, and frequency) and all cause, cardiovascular, and respiratory mortality. Design: Two stage time series analysis. Setting: 645 locations across 34 countries or regions. Population: Daily mortality data, comprising a total of 109 954 744 all cause, 31 164 161 cardiovascular, and 11 817 278 respiratory deaths fro...
Background: Land-use and land-cover change (LULCC) can substantially affect climate through biogeochemical and biogeophysical effects. Here, we examine the future temperature-mortality impact for two contrasting LULCC scenarios in a background climate of low greenhouse gas concentrations. The first LULCC scenario implies a globally sustainable land use and socioeconomic development (sustainability). In the seco...
Background: Extreme temperatures contribute significantly to global mortality. While previous studies on temperature and stroke-specific outcomes presented conflicting results, these studies were predominantly limited to single-city or single-country analyses. Their findings are difficult to synthesize due to variations in methodologies and exposure definitions. Methods: Within the Multi-Country Multi-City Netw...
Background: Wildfire activity is an important source of tropospheric ozone (O3) pollution. However, no study to date has systematically examined the associations of wildfire-related O3 exposure with mortality globally. Methods: We did a multicountry two-stage time series analysis. From the Multi-City Multi-Country (MCC) Collaborative Research Network, data on daily all-cause, cardiovascular, and respiratory dea...
Background: The regional disparity of heatwave-related mortality over a long period has not been sufficiently assessed across the globe, impeding the localisation of adaptation planning and risk management towards climate change. We quantified the global mortality burden associated with heatwaves at a spatial resolution of 0.5°×0.5° and the temporal change from 1990 to 2019. Methods and findings: We collected d...
Combined heat and humidity is frequently described as the main driver of human heat-related mortality, more so than dry-bulb temperature alone. While based on physiological thinking, this assumption has not been robustly supported by epidemiological evidence. By performing the first systematic comparison of eight heat stress metrics (i.e., temperature combined with humidity and other climate variables) with war...
Background: The global spatiotemporal pattern of mortality risk and burden attributable to tropical cyclones is unclear. We aimed to evaluate the global short-term mortality risk and burden associated with tropical cyclones from 1980 to 2019. Methods: The wind speed associated with cyclones from 1980 to 2019 was estimated globally through a parametric wind field model at a grid resolution of 0·5° × 0·5°. A tota...
Background: The global spatiotemporal pattern of mortality risk and burden attributable to tropical cyclones is unclear. We aimed to evaluate the global short-term mortality risk and burden associated with tropical cyclones from 1980 to 2019. Methods: The wind speed associated with cyclones from 1980 to 2019 was estimated globally through a parametric wind field model at a grid resolution of 0·5° × 0·5°. A tota...
Background: Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death worldwide. Existing studies on the association between temperatures and cardiovascular deaths have been limited in geographic zones and have generally considered associations with total cardiovascular deaths rather than cause-specific cardiovascular deaths. Methods: We used unified data collection protocols within the Multi-Country Multi-City Collab...