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Abstract
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Proponents of drastic greenhouse gas controls claim that human greenhouse gas emissions cause global warming, which then exacerbates the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events, including extreme heat, droughts, floods, and storms such as hurricanes and cyclones.
In fact, even though reporting of such events is more complete than in the past, morbidity and mortality attributed to them has declined globally by 93%–98% since the 1920s. In the U.S., morbidity and mortality from extreme weather events peaked decades ago. Depending on the category of extreme weather event, average annual mortality is 59%–81% lower than at its peak, while mortality rates declined 72%–94%, despite large increases in the population at risk. Today, extreme weather events contribute only 0.06% to global and U.S. mortality. These improvements reflect a remarkable improvement in society’s adaptive capacity, likely due to greater wealth and better technology enabled in part by use of hydrocarbon fuels. Finally, mortality from extreme weather events has declined even as all-cause mortality has increased, indicating that humanity is coping better with extreme weather events than it is with far more important health and safety problems. |