Climate Change And Covid-19: A Blessing In Disguise Or A Health Hazard

Abstract

Climate change has now been linked to dozens of extreme weather events and temperature anomalies. The effects on health are posing elevated risk across many impact areas: infectious diseases, cardiovascular, respiratory and mental health problems, malnutrition, etc. This paper aims to highlight both positive as well as negative relationship between Covid-19 pandemic and climate change. Pandemics leave their mark quickly and that is what Covid-19 has done to the world. The alarming exponential increase in the transmission and fatality rates related to this disease has brought the world to a halt so as to cope up its stern consequences. This has led to the imposition of lockdown across the globe to prevent the further spread of this disease which brought about drastic impacts at social and economic fronts. Its multifarious presence has wreaked havoc on physical, economic and social lives of people across the world after its breakout in December 2019. It appeared as the world grappled with the epidemic of climate change. The emergency has acutely overshadowed public reckoning with the climate crises, the outbreak is still growing in most of the places. However, it also posed some positive impacts on environment as well, particularly in the context of air quality and has also led to a decline in industry supply chains, reducing demand for commercial activities that exploit natural resources in many parts of the world. The amount of pollution in the air, water, soil and noise showed a significant decline during the pandemic. Global air quality improved due to lower anthropogenic emissions of air pollutants and atmospheric particles.