Around 62.11 million children, or 51.70 per cent of those born in 2020, are expected to experience an unparalleled lifetime exposure to heatwaves, even with global warming restricted to a 1.5 degree Celsius rise, a new study indicated.
The report was published by Save the Children, a global non-governmental organisation, along with Vrije Universiteit Brussel, a research university located in Brussels, Belgium.
Children born in 2020 are expected to encounter unparalleled climate extremes during their lives, the research showed. With current climate scenarios likely leading to a 2.7°C increase in global temperatures above pre-industrial levels, around 100 million of the estimated 120 million children born in 2020, or 83 per cent, will be exposed to extreme heat throughout their lifetimes, the analysts found.
The study further explored a more intense scenario where global temperatures increase to 3.5°C by 2100. In this situation, about 92 per cent of children born in 2020, roughly 111 million, would encounter unparalleled lifetime exposure to heatwaves. Here, 'unprecedented' means exposure to climate extremes that would have only a 1 in 10,000 chance of occurring during one's lifetime in a world without human-caused climate change. Essentially, it refers to new levels of climate extremes never experienced before, which the climate crisis now compels us to deal with.
Countries with low income experienced the greatest exposure to heatwaves across different generations. This issue is rooted not only in geography but also in inequality. Individuals with minimal resources and least contribution to climate change are inevitably subjected to the harshest effects of temperature extremes caused by climate change.
Extreme heat is deadly for children, taking an immense toll on their physical and mental health, disrupting access to food and clean water, and forcing schools to close, the report noted.
The report Born into the Climate Crisis 2- an Unprecedented Life: Protecting Children's Rights in a Changing Climate concluded that achieving the 1.5°C target would safeguard millions of children born in 2020 from the most severe impacts of climate-related disasters like crop failures, floods, tropical cyclones, droughts and wildfires. The analysis suggested that 7.7 million children could be shielded from crop failures that threaten food security, 4.8 million from river flooding, 4.9 million from tropical cyclones, 1.9 million from droughts, and 1.5 million from wildfires, if global warming is tamed to 1.5°C.
Crop failures endanger children's nutrition, heightening the risk of undernutrition, wasting and stunting, and impairing their development. In a scenario of 3.5°C global warming, 29 per cent of children (34.85 million) born in 2020 are expected to face unprecedented levels of crop failure.
The researchers also trained the spotlight on the fact that climate extremes are increasingly impacting children by displacing them from their homes, making food inaccessible, harming educational institutions and heightening risks such as child marriage as they are driven out of school and into poverty and food scarcity.
The findings underscored the urgent need for ongoing reductions in emissions to halt further warming and safeguard the rights and futures of children globally amid the climate crisis.