Implications of Climate change on Human health: An Agricultural Perspective

Abstract

Malaria is the second most prevalent disease in Pakistan. Despite many malaria eradication programs the disease burden is increasing. Changing climate affects humans directly and indirectly. In direct case, it causes an increase in malarial morbidity while it affects the physical strength and working efficiency of humans indirectly that ultimately leads to higher expenditures on medication. Farm workers are the community, highly affected through malaria because they are prone to work in environmental conditions which are favorite habitats of mosquito production. Loss of family labor and increased expenditures lead to a loss in revenue earned from agriculture. So, main objectives of the study were to determine the spatio-temporal effects of climate change on morbidity caused by malaria including socio-economic conditions and further to find the impact of health shocks of malaria on farm workers and then how these health shocks lead to decrease in revenue earned from agricultural production. In first part, linkages between climate change, socio economic conditions and malaria were found on monthly basis from the year 2000 to 2013 in 15 districts of Province Punjab. After this, the district more prone to malaria was selected where health shocks due to malaria were calculated for farm workers and further the effect on revenue from crop production due to health shocks was estimated. The stepwise model selection procedure was adopted and Generalized Linear Model with negative binomial family was selected for secondary data analysis. Results of the study show that temperature, rainfall and humidity variables have significant relationship as two months lag to the malaria month of interest and their quadratic terms also showed a significant but negative relationship with the malaria prevalence. Females’ education showed negative and significant relationship while education of males showed negative but insignificant relationship. On the other hand health facility provision per thousand of population was positive and highly significant that was contrary to the expectations and it was found that health facilities with inadequate quality do not contribute positively to minimize the malaria burden. District dummies showed that district Muzaffargarh is the area highly affected due to malaria prevalence. The detailed analysis was carried out by using primary data. Simultaneous equation approach was used to analyze the data. The ill member not only cause a loss in family labor but household also hires labor that automatically increases the cost and further time spent of care giving by an active family member also cause an increase in expenditure that increases total cost on cultivation per acre. The data analysis was carried out in the simultaneous equation framework and in final equation it was found that with one unit increase in the cost of malaria cure per acre revenue decreases by 2530 rupees. The effect of disease is different from one district to other so a targeted health intervention is required to meet the sustainable development goal of malaria eradication. Further, besides other effects of climate change, its effect on human health should be given due consideration.