62 Million Hit, Thousands Dead In 2018 Extreme Events – UN

Fueled by climate change, extreme weather disasters hit 62 million people in 2018, U.N. says

Doyle Rice, March 29, 2019 (USA Today)

“…Extreme weather events, supercharged by climate change, affected some 62 million people around the world in 2018, [according to the annual "State of the Climate" report from] the World Meteorological Organization (WMO)…[T]he planet's biggest weather woes last year were floods (which swamped some 35 million people), and droughts, which affected another 9 million…[Since 1998, the study shows,] about 4.5 billion around the world have been hurt by extreme weather…[and] climate science has provided solid evidence of accelerating sea level rise, shrinking sea ice, increasingly acidic oceans, glacier retreat, shrinking polar ice, and extreme events such as heat waves…

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[Since the late 1800s, it adds, the global average temperature has risen almost 2 degrees (Fahrenheit) and] the past four years have been the warmest on record…[Science has established that the cause is burning fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas,] which releases greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane into the Earth's atmosphere and oceans…Levels of carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere reached record levels in 2018…[and the] devastation continued in early 2019,] with Tropical Cyclone Idai, which caused devastating floods and tragic loss of life in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi…[that killed at] least 750 people…” click here for more

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