From the exaggeration department …because that extra 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit is somehow far more powerful than the range of climate and weather extremes that human experience and live in daily. And, since when is an opinion poll equal to science? Next they’ll be telling us that 97% of Thoracic physicians…
Climate change affects human health, ATS membership survey shows
The American Thoracic Society has published the results of a survey of the ATS membership on climate change which found that the majority of ATS members believe that climate change is real and that it is having a negative impact on the health of the patients that they care for.
“Our physician members are seeing the effects that climate change is having on the well-being of their patients,” said John R. Balmes, MD, Chair of the ATS Environmental Health Policy Committee, who was one of the survey’s authors. “These results talk to the importance of groups involved in healthcare taking a stand on this issue, and educating their members and the patients that they serve that climate change is a healthcare issue.”
Key results of the survey include:
- 89% of respondents believe climate change is happening
- 68% believe climate change is being driven entirely or mostly by human activity
- 65% believe climate change is relevant to direct patient care (either a great deal or a moderate amount)
- Free text responses indicate physician believe they are seeing climate change health effects in patients today
The survey, which was conducted by the Center for Climate Change Communication at George Mason University, polled 5,500 US ATS members and asked a series of questions about climate change and its impact on patients. The survey had a response rate of 17% and received responses from 49 states and the District of Columbia.
Reported adverse health effects attributed to climate change included worsening of asthma due to exposure to ozone or other pollutants, longer and more severe allergy seasons, and an increased number of cases of acute and chronic lung conditions.
In addition to Dr. Balmes, other ATS authors of the survey included Gary Ewart, Senior Director of ATS Government Relations and George D. Thurston, DSc, and Tee L. Guidotti, MD, MPH, who are Vice Chair and member, respectively, of the ATS Environmental Health Policy Committee.
The survey results are published in the February issue of the Annals of the American Thoracic Society.
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Now we have science by survey, forget data. Why don’t we have a show of hands to solve the mystery of dark energy. Or while we’re at it lets have a survey and cure cancer.
Man-made climate change causes war, terror, torture and atrocities!
http://www.theverge.com/2015/3/4/8146789/climate-change-syria-war-drought-study
Makes me wonder what caused the previous 5000 years of recorded conflict in the Middle East, before humans took control of global climate change.
They seem confused between real air pollutants, which can affect some people during temperature inversions wherein the pollutants don’t have a chance to disperse, and the fake pollutant, CO2. I’m sure that years of the MSM showing billowing, dark clouds of water vapor emissions spewing from cooling towers had nothing to do with it.
It amazes me how many educated people have been brainwashed into regarding CO2 as a pollutant. They imagine that the EPA is protecting the environment by regulating it.
I’m going to go out and rob a bank, and when they come to arrest me I’ll claim that Climate Change made me do it….
The survey was extremely effective. The American Thoracic Society is struggling for relevance, and now, thanks to the survey report, we have now heard of the American Thoracic Society. Who knew they existed?
“Except an obituary notice, any publicity is good publicity.” – Brendan Behan (paraphrased)
“Hi, I’m from the Center for Climate Change Communication, and I’m conducting a survey on the effects of climate change. I’d like to ask you some questions about the effects of climate change on your patients.”
With that introduction, how could you say anything BUT it affects your patients. Or you hang up/throw the letter in the trash.
Then, since you are the Center for Climate Change Communication, you publish what the 17% respondents said. So who is more corrupt, ATS or CfCCC? Looks like a tie to me.
And a new study from Columbia University suggests that Global Warming / Climate Change was a cause of the Syrian Civil War:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2976063/Did-climate-change-trigger-war-Syria-Severe-drought-contributed-uprising-study-reveals.html
However, he forgot to mention that:
a. There had been no Global Warming for 15 years prior to this conflict.
b. Most of Syria’s water shortages are due to Turkey’s new Attaturk Dam, which is stealing much of the waters of the Euphrates.
c. This conflict is not new – far from it. The modern conflict against the Alawites actually started in 1981-82 – against Hafez Assad, the father of Bashar Assad. His father did the same as Bashar in the current conflict, and killed up to 40,000 people in Hamma. Sorry, but was there any Global Warming in 1982?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_Hama_massacre
And if you go back further in time you will find that the Alawites of Syria have been a grievously persecuted minority, and lived in the gutters of Syrian society, for more than 1,200 years. The Alawites only gained control of the Syrian army in the 1920s because the French wanted an ally in the region. They took control of the government in 1970, and having been persecuted for 1,200 years, they have wisely never relinquished that control. So why the persecution of the Alawites? Because the Alawites are really Nazarene Christio-Muslims, who have hidden behind a cloak of Islam and refuse to go to mosque.
This is why the Armenian and Syriac Christians in Syria have backed Assad and the Alawites all this time. Why? Because they know they are in the same boat as the Alawites. If Assad is defeated, they will be murdered and exiled too. This is why Hussain Obama’s military support for the Syrian terrorists is so pernicious, because what he is actually funding is the potential murder and exile of 4 million Christians and 4 million Christio-Alawites. So why would Hussain Obama want to fund the extermination of Christians? I’ll give you one guess.
And what does all of this have to do with Global Warming? Diddly Squat, as you all know. Dr Richard Seager of the Columbia University is merely another scientific prostitute, who has added ‘climate change’ to a report to get more funding. I wonder if he has a red light outside his office, and poses provocatively in the window?
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Dr Richard Seager in his offices at Columbia University.
http://www.theage.com.au/ffximage/2007/09/21/Redlight_wideweb__470x340,0.jpg
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Damn, can I lift that (with an attribution of “not mine but a great post”)??? I needed that one yesterday…
Tim Wohlford
Sure, no problem. Lots more where that came from.
Indeed, I like to credit myself with stopping the war against Assad in Syria.** After organising a long email campaign involving many complainants writing to MPs, the UK parliamentarians had a vote on whether to go to war. Many of the MPs who said ‘thanks’ to our emails failed to turn up for the vote, so the government lost the motion. And without the support of the UK, Hussain Obama also had to back down and not assist the Syrian terrorists. Probably not entirely due to our email campaign, but it was certainly a deciding factor.
Like media reporters, many MPs are empty vessels, and you have to fill them with relevant and valid data. Which is why letters to editors and MPs are never a waste of time. And since the Biased Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) will not do this for us, we have to do it ourselves. The BBC, who genuflect to anything Islamic, were still calling ISIS ‘freedom fighters’ – until the heads of several media reporters started rolling around on the ground.
The result of this vote in the UK parliament was that ISIS was not able to get its hands on Assad’s 2,000 tonnes of Sarin gas (which was still up for grabs at the time). The prospect of the Syrian terrorists (who are indistinguishable from ISIS) getting 2,000 tonnes of poison gas was a real concern to us, as we said to all the MPs in our emails. The gas could have been used locally against Syrian Christians and Christio-Alawites, or exported to the London tube or the New York metro. It does not bear thinking about. But Hussain Obama and our pea-brained foreign minister, William Hague, did not even consider the possible outcome of their stupidity. (Well, stupidity by Hague but probably purposeful design by Hussain Obama.)
** As ever in eastern politics, this is not the ‘right’ option but merely the lesser of two evils. Same with Gadaffi of Libya, Mubarak of Egypt, Ben Ali of Tunisia and even Hussain of Iraq. Eastern lands are always better off with despotic secular leaders, than tyrannical theocracies.
R
Hard to find good Alawite stories these days…
Outstanding…err…graphics.
Yes, I too thought Richard Seager has a couple of good points…. 😉
R
Damn why are you confusing perfectly good opportunities for AGW propaganda with real history and pictures of pretty, er, women. Oh I yearn for the good old days when Armenians were the big terror threat and all you really had to worry about was the errant Turk or two
Caption – Climate scientist at work.
>>Caption –- “Climate scientist at work.”
Now that would make a great Heartland billboard. Try pasting that one in downtown Washington, and see what they say….
😉
R
As a meteorologist, I wonder when the AMS is going to poll me about my thoughts on the efficacy of thoracic surgery. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.
From here it’s only a short stretch to climate change as a race card item and gender item. Remember the children too.
Question for the ATS — last I checked, around $357 billion was being spent annually on “global warming.” What would happen, globally, if that actually went for treatments?
As one of those odd folks who actually walks around the Doctor’s office reading posted diplomas and awards; I can just visualize a new posting announcing that the Doctor is one of the proud 17% percent respondents believing in CAGW impacts to human health.
Definitely means a decision to find a different Doctor. It does not require evidence that climatic change actually harms people’s health, only faith is necessary. Good Lord, the damage that such a surgeon could do when they never stop to actually think.
How timely! In today’s paper… More global warming doom and gloom.
Trevor Hancock: Climate change poses severe health risks
Dr. Trevor Hancock is a professor and senior scholar at the University of Victoria’s school of public health and social policy.
http://www.timescolonist.com/opinion/columnists/trevor-hancock-climate-change-poses-severe-health-risks-1.1780966
I don’t understand why this is being ridiculed.
Thoracic surgeons looked at their data for the last 30 years and analysed the number of cases, assigning a level of severity to each case. Then they broke this down by year and showed a clear correlation between global warming and both the number and severity of thoracic cases across the USA.
Oh…. hang on – I think I understand. That’s what they DIDN’T do.
They decided not to look at the data and instead asked thoracic surgeons what they BELIEVED was happening. The only redeeming aspect of this story is that 83% of thoracic surgeons realised the stupidity of relying on belief to present a scientific argument.
And if you live in the USA and are scheduled for thoracic surgery, the most worrying aspect is that you may have selected a surgeon who replied to this survey.
Here’s the finding that is the biggest shocker (from the abstract):
A majority of respondents indicated they were already observing health impacts of climate change among their patients, most commonly as increases in chronic disease severity from air pollution (77%)
Q’s — Do they not know the difference between climate change (ACC), and air pollution?
Do they not know that air pollution continues to decrease (somethings we do support)?
Are they nuts?
This just popped up. So, if studies are showing that the improving air quality is resulting in stronger healthier lungs, what in the world are these Doctors talking about?
“Cleaner air has for the first time been linked to bigger and stronger lungs among school-age children, according to findings released Wednesday from a two-decade study in Southern California..
The research by USC scientists, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, found the region’s steep decline in air pollution since the mid-1990s is strongly associated with “statistically and clinically significant improvements” in children’s lung function and growth.”
Yet, for a decade, the CONUS has actually cooled.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/temp-and-precip/national-temperature-index/time-series?datasets%5B%5D=uscrn¶meter=anom-tavg&time_scale=p12&begyear=2004&endyear=2014&month=12
JP,
Yes, despite the efforts of government agencies to pretend they aren’t:
Good to know that a bunch of life science guys are able to lift their heads from proctoscopes long enough to opine on global warming. Next thing you know, we’ll have particle physicists wanting to perform heart bypass operations.
This reminds me of the double Nobel laureate Linus Pauling’s theory: once you’ve taken enough vitamin C to kill you, you don’t need to worry about catching a cold. The corollary: just because you’re very good in one discipline (e.g.: most MD’s) doesn’t necessarily mean you’re any good in any unrelated discipline.
The bumper sticker: BEWARE THE ACKNOWLEDGED EXPERT OPERATING OUT OF HIS FIELD
It is highly unlikely that “most MD’s” are “very good” considering that the medical business is a leading cause of death and is highly corrupted read: “Death by Medicine” by Carolyn Dean, Ghislaine Lanctôt’s “The Medical Mafia,” Marcia Angell’s “The Truth about the Drug Companies” or Peter Gøtzsche’s “Deadly Medicines and Organised Crime”).
Of course, living in a huge propaganda culture like the US you’re like the majority of the public who believe glorified disinformation such as that “most MD’s” are “very good.”
Peter Gøtzsche, MD, had explained the argument that people of one discipline cannot know what they’re talking about when dispensing information in a unrelated discipline has been used by stupid people forever.
The Pauling bashing has also gone on for decades. The primary “stupid people” propagandizing this notion are medical doctors and other ignoramuses or pawns of the medical business who blindly repeat their nonsense. (Bumper stickers with hype slogans on it, coincidentally, are frequently used by stupid or ignorant people.)
Here is a good example of a hack MD who has been discrediting Pauling and supplements with disinformation and lies: http://www.supplements-and-health.com/vitamin-benefits.html
If you look closely, you’ll find that politics by the allopathy is almost always behind the truly unscientific dumb attacks against Pauling. It’s indicative of how little real science is behind the various claims of traditional medicine.
But can they tell their thorax from their cloaca?
Just to correct a few misconceptions from up above. This isn’t a Society of thoracic surgeons, it’s the largest Society in the US for all respiratory disease, which includes asthma, COPD, lung cancers, etc. (collectively, a huge segment of human disease in the US and worldwide). I was a member for 10 years and went to around 10 of their annual conferences, which are so huge that they can only be held in the largest of conference centers. In my view, the most important function of the conference is to disseminate new results on clinical trial data for important new therapeutics, diagnostics and other treatment modalities. As such, some of the science reported is absolutely first class with the highest level of data analysis and statistical treatment being on display. If climatologists exhibited such rigor, I suspect I wouldn’t be typing this. …. and then the poster sessions have a lot of Mr. Potato Head science, but who doesn’t want a boondoggle in San Francisco or San Diego ??
The number (68% of 17% = ~12%) of respondents who believe climate change is being driven entirely or mostly by human activity is probably an accurate reflection of the guilt-ridden, holier and more politically correct than though brigade in the society (it’s actually lower than I would have guessed).
more politically than thou !! I guess spellcheckers don’t do olde English
more politically correct than thou …. yikes
Ask people in any group if their group has benefited from something, and they will tend to say no, because that implies they should be giving something back. Ask them if their group has suffered from something, and they will tend to say yes, because that implies they should be compensated. And how you ask them is also key. “With billions of dollars being spent each year to study global warming and to compensate innocent victims of this man made phenomenon, has your group’s lives been made more difficult from global warming such that you should be compensated monetarily for your extra efforts?” YES! Gimme Gimme Gimme!
Older peoble move to Florida where it is warm, and they eventually die, so it is clear that warm weather kills more peoble.
What with all these studies about global warming causing health issues, all at the same time?
Here’s another…
New Models Yield Clearer Picture of Emissions’ True Costs
When its environmental and human health toll is factored in, a gallon of gasoline costs us about $3.80 more than the pump price, a new Duke University study finds.
The social cost of a gallon of diesel is about $4.80 more than the pump price; the price of natural gas more than doubles; and coal-fired electricity more than quadruples. Solar and wind power, on the other hand, become cheaper than they initially seem.
http://nicholas.duke.edu/news/new-models-yield-clearer-picture-emissions-true-costs
You can download the pdf file for free here:
http://download.springer.com/static/pdf/498/art%253A10.1007%252Fs10584-015-1343-0.pdf?auth66=1425509655_dd5c2770698ef22d0f063b57db6d3f02&ext=.pdf
Typical modelling, full of “assume”
Funny that the press release did not include his results for nuclear generation, quite good, same as solar or wind power.
If 1.4F was enough to cause a detectable increase in health problems, everyone who lives much south of Canada should be dead by now.
97% of the patients of the “65% believe climate change is relevant to direct patient care (either a great deal or a moderate amount)” may believe that their doctors need psychiatric evaluation to avoid malpractice suits.
with “science” like this, all the people who have died in their sleep are proof that sleep should be avoided at all costs, because it kills people! Wake up people! Sleep kills! Ban sleep now for the sake of the children…. not sure if this is really needs a sarc tag or not… seems things keep getting more curious every day.
Cheers!
Joe
‘The survey, …was conducted by the Center for Climate Change Communication … polled 5,500 US ATS members …The survey had a response rate of 17% …’
Yawn. So they’ve extrapolated this from about 935 Thoracic Surgeons. I happen to have known a Thoracic Surgeon on a professional basis, and there’s not too many of his type either. Very few, in fact. His specialty is lung transplantation. And he made no bones about the abject seriousness of such a procedure. In my first appt. with him in Jan. ’05 he said to me, “This is a last ditch operation.” And, “We don’t perform LTs till the risk of dying from the procedure is exceeded by the risk of dying from the disease.” And, finally, “You want to put this off, ’cause we get better at it.” After a series of bi-yearly appts. he said to me in 2008, “You want to stay away from me.” Finally, in my final appt. with him in early 2011 I said, “I don’t think I have the courage to undergo the procedure.” He responded thoughtfully: “You don’t have to. There’s plenty of good reasons not to undergo the operation.” And added, with great sobriety, “I could shorten your life.”
Now, I couldn’t tell you what this renowned surgeon’s viewpoint towards climate change is. What I can tell you is that he took the promise to ‘above all, do no harm’ very seriously. With each operation he performed he weighed costs and benefits very seriously. He presented no illusions to his patients nor offered them false promises. He fully understood the unknowns and the odds.
Let us have the Center for Climate Change Communication; quick to perform deceitful, simplistic questionnaires; actually have a thoughtful conversation with a true medical professional: one who deals in life in death. Let them give some, at least some, any, consideration to what the monumental costs of an economic transplantation assuredly are compared to what the benefits may be, if (and it’s a big ‘if’) they actually accrue. Nobody, but nobody can argue the “wrenching”
transformations that will be imposed on society by imposing a carbon free future. The hell with these questionnaires.