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US Navy fires captain who sought help for coronavirus-stricken nuclear aircraft carrier

April 4, 2020 Posted by | civil liberties, employment, health, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

U.S. Navy fires captain who warned of Covid 19 on nuclear-powered aircraft carrier

Sailors cheer for aircraft carrier commander who was removed after issuing coronavirus warning By Zachary Cohen and Ryan Browne, CNN April 3, 2020  Sailors aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier cheered for Capt. Brett Crozier as he disembarked the ship for the last time, an overwhelming show of support for their leader who was relieved of his command after issuing a stark warning about a coronavirus outbreak onboard.

New video obtained by CNN shows a large crowd gathered to give Crozier a warm and loud send off, clapping and chanting his name as he left the ship. It was a clear expression of appreciation for their former commander who was removed for what the acting Navy Secretary called “poor judgment.”
“Today at my direction the commanding officer of the USS Theodore Roosevelt, Captain Brett Crozier, was relieved of command by carrier strike group commander Rear Admiral Stewart Baker,” acting Secretary of the Navy Thomas Modly announced on Thursday,
The decision came days after Crozier wrote a memo warning Navy leadership that decisive action was needed to save the lives of the ship’s crew. “We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die. If we do not act now, we are failing to properly take care of our most trusted asset — our Sailors,” it read, three US defense officials confirmed to CNN.
News of Crozier’s removal comes after a US defense official told CNN Friday morning that 137 sailors from the Roosevelt have tested positive for the virus, representing more than 10% of all cases across the US military…..

Escalating outbreak

The outbreak on the ship is escalating rapidly. Last week the Pentagon confirmed three sailors on the Roosevelt had tested positive, and that number had risen to 25 two days later. It rose to at least 70 on Tuesday and more than 100 on Thursday. On Monday, a US defense official told CNN that a second US aircraft carrier, the USS Ronald Reagan, is facing a “handful” of positive cases.
In his memo, Crozier implored Navy leaders to take immediate steps to address the situation.
“Decisive action is required. Removing the majority of personnel from a deployed US nuclear aircraft carrier and isolating them for two weeks may seem like an extraordinary measure,” his memo said.

“This is a necessary risk. It will enable the carrier and air wing to get back underway as quickly as possible while ensuring the health and safety of our Sailors. Keeping over 4,000 young men and women on board the TR is an unnecessary risk and breaks faith with those Sailors entrusted to our care,” Crozier added……. https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/03/politics/uss-theodore-roosevelt-aircraft-carrier-captain-send-off/index.html

April 4, 2020 Posted by | civil liberties, employment, health, PERSONAL STORIES, politics, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Finally: 1000s of sailors leaving nuclear Aircraft Carrier and going into Coronavirus isolation

US Sailors Pour Off Aircraft Carrier and Into Coronavirus Isolation on Guam, Defense One   , BY BRADLEY PENISTON, DEPUTY EDITOR, 2 Apr. 20  NAVY LEADERS PRAISE SHIP’S CAPTAIN FOR URGENT EVACUATION REQUEST; 3,700 WILL LEAVE THE SHIP WITHIN DAYS.

About one-fifth of the USS Theodore Roosevelt’s 4,865 sailors are off the COVID-stricken aircraft carrier and into isolation on Guam, with about 2,700 more expected to evacuate in the next few days, Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly said Wednesday.

Modly’s update comes two days after the ship’s captain sent a stark letter up the chain of command — made public on Tuesday by the San Francisco Chronicle — warning that fully 90 percent of the crew needed to evacuate and isolate for two weeks for their own safety. The secretary’s comments clarify that the Navy was indeed evacuating most sailors from the ship, after Defense Secretary Mark Esper said in a CBS News interview aired late Tuesday that said an evacuation was not yet necessary. Modly praised the captain for the prodding, and said that evacuation efforts already were in the works but not with the right urgency. ….. https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2020/04/us-sailors-pour-aircraft-carrier-and-isolation-guam/164287/?oref=d-topstory

April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, safety, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Second: Navy change of heart: nuclear-powered aircraft carrier sailors can evacuate

April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, safety, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

First: Captain of nuclear-powered aircraft carrier begs to have its sailors evacuated

Navy Rejects Captain’s Plea to Evacuate Virus-Ravaged Carrier, Bloomberg, By Roxana Tiron ,Travis J Tritten, and Glen Carey

April 1, 2020, ‘We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die’: Captain
  • Admiral says sailors will be rotated off in smaller numbers
  • A U.S. Navy captain’s dramatic plea to evacuate most sailors from an aircraft carrier struck by the coronavirus was tamped down by an admiral who called for a more gradual rotation of crew members off the ship that’s sidelined in Guam.

    Citing an “ongoing and accelerating” danger on board the USS Theodore Roosevelt, Captain Brett Crozier sent his Navy superiors a memo pleading, “We are not at war. Sailors do not need to die.” He called for removing all but a skeleton crew off the carrier, where sailors are in close quarters, so that they can be isolated and tested……

    The Roosevelt, meant to be patrolling the Pacific and South China Sea, is sitting dockside in Guam indefinitely as the number of soldiers infected by the novel coronavirus rises daily. Infections started cropping up after an early March port call in Vietnam, which Pentagon leaders say had about 16 known virus cases at the time …… https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-03-31/carrier-s-captain-pleads-for-coronavirus-action-to-save-sailors?fbclid=IwAR2jMtSh2oHrD8_xM384jGcK52DX3TihqP3brMrzaUrSNBgY17GYBVxcbEg

April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, safety, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant’s deadly hazard – highly radioactive sandbags

Nuclear sandbags too hot to handle,  https://www.theaustralian.com.au/world/the-times/nuclear-sandbags-too-hot-to-handle/news-story/87b811443cb8e2881f55e17108872880 By RICHARD LLOYD PARRY, THE TIMES. APRIL 1, 2020  

    Japanese engineers trying to dismantle the melted reactors at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant face a new hazard — radioactive sandbags so deadly that standing next to them for a few minutes could be fatal.

The sandbags were intended to make life easier for the teams dealing with the aftermath of the nuclear disaster in 2011 when three reactors melted after a tsunami destroyed their cooling systems. Twenty-six tonnes of the bags were placed in basements beneath two of the reactors to ­absorb radioactivity from waste water.

They were stuffed with zeolite, minerals that can absorb caesium. Nine years after the disaster, the submerged sandbags have sucked up so much radiation that they now represent a deadly danger themselves.

Samples of zeolite removed from the bags contain caesium, producing huge amounts of radiation, while the sandbags are giving off up to four sieverts of radiation an hour. Fifteen minutes of exposure to this could cause haemorrhaging. After an hour, half of those exposed would eventually die as a result. The maximum lifetime recommended dose of radiation for humans is less than half a sievert.

Tokyo Electric Power Co (Tepco), which operates the plant, had intended to remove the contaminated water by the end of 2020. The complication caused by the sand means it will take three years longer, the latest delay to the decommissioning.

Tepco managers have admitted that the technology needed to finish the job does not exist and they do not have a full idea of how it will be achieved. Their stated goal of decommissioning by 2051 may be impossible, they said.

One of the biggest problems is the 170 tonnes of irradiated water coming out of the plant every day, much of it natural ground water that flows through the earth ­towards the sea, picking up radiation on the way. Tepco pumps it out and stores it in huge storage tanks, filtered of some, but not all, of its contaminants — 1.17 million tonnes so far. In two years, the storage space will run out.

The government wants to pour the water away, insisting that the diluting effect of the ­Pacific will render the radiation harmless, but it is opposed by North and South Korea and the local fishing industry, whose reputation has been ruined by the disaster.

April 2, 2020 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, radiation, Reference | Leave a comment

Russia concerned about coronavirus and nuclear safety, as four nuclear workers test positive4

Four nuclear workers test positive for coronavirus as Rosatom steps up pandemic response  Bellona, April 1, 2020 by Charles Digges The staff of at least one nuclear power plant in Russia has been put into isolation due to concerns over the spread of Covid-19, as Rosatom, Russia’s state nuclear corporation, announced a raft of measures to protect the employees of its sprawling domestic and international apparatus.

Four Russian nuclear workers have tested positive for the coronavirus and the staff of a nuclear power plant has been put into isolation while state nuclear corporation Rosatom implements a raft of measures to protect employees of its sprawling domestic and international apparatus.

As Moscow – and the rest of the world – institutes lockdowns for its citizens, Rostom says it is erring on the side of caution to protect its highly skilled workers against an international pandemic that has infected some 877,000 people around the planet. As of March 31, Russia claims 2,337 of those cases………

On Monday, Alexei Likhachev, Rosatom’s CEO said in a video address on the company’s website that he had instituted corporation-wide health checks and sanitation practices at nuclear facilities in Russia, and had sent home all employees who could feasibly work remotely.

But he left broader decisions about staff quarantines up to local authorities, both in the Russian regions where Rosatom operates facilities as well as in foreign countries.

To that end, he said that Rosatom is continuing the construction of nuclear stations abroad despite the global coronavirus outbreak. But he added that the majority of business trips scheduled for Rosatom employees had been cancelled. …….

Throughout the world, nuclear operators are grappling with the advance of the coronavirus, which causes the Covid-19 illness. Some countries, like the United States, are suggesting that nuclear power plant operators should be isolated on site to prevent their specialized staff from falling ill.

The United Kingdom has already shut down one of its nuclear fuel reprocessing sites after a portion of its technicians were forced to self-isolate after being exposed to the virus.

In France, the Le Hague reprocessing facility has likewise been stalled. And while France’s national operator EDF has refused to comment about the level of absenteeism or the number of confirmed coronavirus infections among its staff, it says its nuclear power plants could operate for three months with a 25 percent reduction in staffing levels and for two to three weeks with 40 percent fewer staff.

Rosatom’s 250,000 employees operate 38 nuclear reactors throughout Russia and staff numerous mining, technological and sales concerns throughout Europe, Asia and the Middle East. The corporation also has 36 power units at different stages of implementation in 12 countries around the world. It is currently constructing seven reactors overseas: two each in Bangladesh, Belarus and India, plus one unit in Turkey.

April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, Russia | Leave a comment

38 sailors on nuclear-powered aircraft carrier positive for COVID-19, U.S. military secretive on impact of virus

The Coronavirus Can’t Stop America’s Nukes, Popular Mechanics,  

APR 1, 2020

Relying on a high-state of readiness, the nuclear triad is under threat from the coronavirus……….in a War of the Worlds-style twist, humanity’s most lethal weapons could be nullified by an organism that can’t even be seen.   ……

How badly the nuclear forces have been impacted by the pandemic will likely remain secret. Last week, U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper, in an interview with Reuters, said the military will reveal only broad data about infections in the armed forces. Esper wants “some of the more mission-specific information to be withheld to prevent compromising operational security. We’re not going to disaggregate numbers because it could reveal information about where we may be affected at a higher rate than maybe some other places.’”  ………
 small outbreaks can still impact operations. At least 38 Navy sailors on board the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier in the western Pacific have tested positive for coronavirus so far. The conditions onboard a vessel is conducive to the spread of disease, as navies have long suffered through since the Age of Sail.
These kinds of isolated-but-intense flare-ups could hamper the Air Force’s bombers and ICBMs, especially if certain, specially-trained members take ill at the same time. Losing a small number of B-2 pilots, for example, would have a much greater impact than quarantining a dozen security team members………  https://www.popularmechanics.com/military/weapons/a31993907/nuclear-readiness-coronavirus/

April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, USA, weapons and war | 1 Comment

U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission weakens some regulations in view of COVID-19

Nuclear regulators ease some power reactor regs in response to COVID-19,  By Matthew Bandyk Utility Dive, March 31, 2020, 

  • In response to the COVID-19 pandemic and its strain on available nuclear plant personnel, the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission is allowing power reactor operators to apply for temporary exemptions from regulations limiting the amount of hours workers can stay on the job, according to a letter released by the agency on Monday.
  • In addition, the NRC staff is also working on a separate memorandum that will guide nuclear plants as to which labor and time-intensive tasks they can temporarily waive, such as many of the inspections during refueling outages………
Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety for the Union of Concerned Scientists, argues that limiting these inspections and other activities has a tradeoff with risk. …….. https://www.utilitydive.com/news/nuclear-regulators-ease-some-power-reactor-regs-in-response-to-covid-19/575000/
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April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, safety, USA | 1 Comment

The nuclear industry and the impact of coronavirus

April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, safety, USA | Leave a comment

Montgomery County officials not happy with Exelon’s Limerick Nuclear Power Plant plans for addressing Covid19

Montgomery County officials question social distancing at Limerick nuclear plant, abc Action News, By Bob Brooks,  April 1, 2020 

LIMERICK TOWNSHIP, Pennsylvania (WPVI) — There’s a major dispute brewing between Montgomery County and the Exelon Corporation, and it all has to do with the coronavirus and the Limerick nuclear power plant.

A parking lot has been designated for the new contractors that have been hired as the annual refuel of the reactor maintenance project is underway.

But according to Montgomery County there’s a big problem.

Dr. Valerie A. Arkoosh, chair of the Montgomery County Board of Commissioners, says back on March 16, Exelon, the company that runs the Limerick nuclear plant, gave them a lackluster social distancing plan.

She said, “We learned of plans to bring approximately 1,800 workers into our region from around the United States. We asked Exelon to postpone this refuel until a time when the disease burden from COVID-19 was lower.” …….. https://6abc.com/limerick-plant-exelon-corporation-covid19-cases/6067085/

April 2, 2020 Posted by | health, safety, USA | Leave a comment

Our war against the environment is bringing pandemics upon us

Coronavirus is a wake-up call: our war with the environment is leading to pandemics,  The Conversation, Fiona Armstrong Executive Director, Climate and Health Alliance, Occasional Lecturer, School of Public Health and Human Biosciences, La Trobe University, Anthony Capon, Director, Monash Sustainable Development Institute, Monash University, Ro McFarlane, Assistant Professor in Ecological Public Health, University of Canberra, March 31, 202  The COVID-19 pandemic sweeping across the world is a crisis of our own making.

That’s the message from infectious disease and environmental health experts, and from those in planetary health – an emerging field connecting human health, civilisation and the natural systems on which they depend.

They might sound unrelated, but the COVID-19 crisis and the climate and biodiversity crises are deeply connected.

Each arises from our seeming unwillingness to respect the interdependence between ourselves, other animal species and the natural world more generally.

To put this into perspective, the vast majority (three out of every four) of new infectious diseases in people come from animals – from wildlife and from the livestock we keep in ever-larger numbers.

To understand and effectively respond to COVID-19, and other novel infectious diseases we’ll likely encounter in the future, policymakers need to acknowledge and respond with “planetary consciousness”. This means taking a holistic view of public health that includes the health of the natural environment.

Risking animal-borne diseases

Biodiversity (all biological diversity from genes, to species, to ecosystems) is declining faster than at any time in human history.

We clear forests and remove habitat, bringing wild animals closer to human settlements. And we hunt and sell wildlife, often endangered, increasing the risk of disease transmission from animals to humans.

The list of diseases that have jumped from animals to humans (“zoonotic diseases”) includes HIV, Ebola, Zika, Hendra, SARS, MERS and bird flu.

Like its precursor SARS, COVID-19 is thought to have originated in bats and subsequently transmitted to humans via another animal host, possibly at a wet market trading live animals.

Ebola virus emerged in central Africa when land use changes and altered climatic conditions forced bats and chimpanzees together around concentrated areas of food resources. And Hendra virus is associated with urbanisation of fruit bats following habitat loss. Such changes are occurring worldwide.

What’s more, human-caused climate change is making this worse. Along with habitat loss, shifting climate zones are causing wildlife to migrate to new places, where they interact with other species they haven’t previously encountered. This increases the risk of new diseases emerging.

COVID-19 is just the latest new infectious disease arising from our collision with nature……. https://theconversation.com/coronavirus-is-a-wake-up-call-our-war-with-the-environment-is-leading-to-pandemics-135023

March 31, 2020 Posted by | 2 WORLD, environment, health | Leave a comment

Coronavirus: USA Nuclear Sites Could Run Out of Critical Supplies

Coronavirus and the states: Plastic bag bans on hold; nuclear plants run low on gloves, masks, wipes.  Missoula, BY MATT VASILOGAMBROS, 30 Mar 20

“…… Nuclear Sites Could Run Out of Critical Supplies.   Nuclear sites across the country might soon run out of gloves, masks and wipes. The U.S. Energy Department said the priority was to supply those items to health care workers and others on the frontline of the coronavirus epidemic.

That means thousands of nuclear power plant workers across the country may not have the protection needed to do their jobs. Nuclear Energy Institute CEO Maria Korsnick anticipated the shortage as early as last week, when she asked U.S. Energy Secretary Dan Brouillette for supplies and testing kits.

To be sure, not every plant expects to run out of masks. The Tennessee Valley Authority this week donated more than 50,000 masks to state emergency responders, according to spokeswoman Melinda Hunter.

Still, the TVA has worked to adapt to the crisis, including reducing power at some plants. One of its plants, Sequoyah, downsized its refueling crew from 1,000 to 800. No TVA worker had tested positive for COVID-19 as of Thursday.

Regulators also have been scrambling to adapt. The U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission will allow plants to operate with fewer workers on duty for longer hours, said Scott Burnell, a spokesman for the agency, in an email.

Environmental activists say now is not the time to cut corners and risk a nuclear accident. “An accident with a major release of radiation or the threat of it during this time of pandemic and social isolation would be a double whammy,” said Don Safer, a member of the board of the Tennessee Environmental Council, which advocates for renewable energy. “A major evacuation now would be chaos.”….. https://missoulacurrent.com/government/2020/03/states-coronavirus/

March 31, 2020 Posted by | health, USA | Leave a comment

EDF workers at Hinkley Point C nuclear site are a major health risk to local residents

West Somerset Free Press 27th March 2020, EDF workers living in village accommodation around Hinkley Point are a major health risk to residents and should be moved out to purpose-built campuses which have strict health precautions, local councillors urged this week.
Despite a decision by EDF on Wednesday to reduce its Hinkley C
workforce by half to around 2,000 in the coming days in an attempt to limit
the spread of the coronavirus, it was claimed that while residents were in
lockdown, HPC construction workers could “come and go as they wish”.
“People are very scared and concerned,” said Cllr Chris Morgan,
chairman of Stogursey Parish Council and the area’s councillor on
Somerset West and Taunton Council. “What is happening is a recipe for
disaster.”
Cllr Morgan said that, while he welcomed the reduction in the
Hinkley workforce, “you have still got a very large group of people doing
what everyone else has been told not to do. “We have a large multiple
occupation building (HMO) in the middle of the village, another in Castle
Street, one in Burton and many rented rooms, all full of people going to
work, coming back, using the shops, all mixing together.
“When you have a predominantly older age group it is a recipe for disaster. “Most of the villages around Hinkley Point have quarantined themselves but when you have got people constantly doing the complete opposite of that being asked of the people who live here, it just doesn’t seem right. “The answer could be to move workers out of the villages back to purpose-built campuses. It’s not beyond the capabilities of EDF to do that.
This is a national emergency.” Parish council vice-chairman Cllr Sue Goss said that, while she also welcomed the cut in the Hinkley workforce, it did not go far enough to address the needs of the local community. “Our main concern,
particularly in Stogursey parish, is that we still have contractors who
quite rightly go home at the weekends, some to the Covid 19 hotspots of
South Wales and the West Midlands, and then return to the middle of our
local community, totally untested, before they return to the site.
“We are in discussion with EDF and the local councils to see what other
measures can be taken, but at the moment it seems that the only real
control over the situation would be to shut the site down, which I don’t
think will happen because it is a critical national infrastructure
project.”    https://www.wsfp.co.uk/article.cfm?id=123896&headline=Health%20fears%20over%20Hinkley%20workers

March 31, 2020 Posted by | health, UK | Leave a comment

Coronavirus Shows Us What Our Future Could Look Like During Climate Crisis

Coronavirus Shows Us What Our Future Could Look Like During Climate Crisis, BY Sharon Zhang, Truthout, March 29, 2020  The COVID-19 pandemic has rapidly been absorbed into our collective consciousness, remaking the fabric of our lives. Suddenly, millions are sheltering in place, strangers have started wishing each other well when exiting grocery stores, people have stopped touching their faces and shelves that are normally stocked with bleach and hand sanitizer are barren.

For many, the looming sense of dread is a new sensation….

But for those of us who have lived in acute awareness of the reality of the climate crisis, the current state of pandemic dread feels awfully familiar — just a more imminent version of the dread about the climate that we have been feeling for years.

It’s a psychological phenomenon known informally in the climate community as climate anxiety, climate grief or eco-anxiety…….

Though the pandemic-panic that Mull and others have written on has been ongoing for the past few weeks, climate writers started opening up about their climate grief years ago. …….

But it’s not just psychological trauma that these two crises share — if you take the time to look, the similarities run wide and deep. These are twin worldwide crises that require global cooperation to defeat; they will ravage the way of life as we know it; they will affect, in one way or another, nearly every single person on Earth.

The economy as we know it — rather, as we knew it three months ago — will be a thing of the past if we let the climate crisis continue unmitigated…….

Economists are currently struggling to model all of the short-term effects of the pandemic, so many of those remain unknown. Climate researchers, however, have had much more time to model the future economic impacts of the climate crisis. By 2090, in the U.S. alone and under the same high emissions scenario, NCA researchers predict that costs from mortality due to extreme temperatures will total $141 billion a year, losses of coastal property will total $118 billion a year, and labor losses will cost $155 billion a year. That’s equivalent to a Hurricane Katrina every single year, just from lost labor.

The health care system, too, will be overwhelmed by the climate crisis, just as hospital beds are rapidly being filled by COVID-19 patients. In some places, the climate crisis has already given a preview of this: In 2018, record heat waves caused U.K. hospitals to utilize emergency procedures, when people were being sent to the hospital in such an overwhelming volume that ambulances had to line up outside.

Though COVID-19 is causing hospitals to fill up simultaneously nationwide, “climate-related events will be more limited in their spatial scale, but will be increasingly frequent over time,” says Kristina Dahl, a senior climate scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists. A heat wave in San Francisco won’t set the whole country ablaze, but it could overwhelm the local health care system.

The key difference between illness caused by a pandemic and the climate crisis, Dahl points out, is that it’s much easier to trace the illness caused by the former. “Things like hurricanes and heat waves and wildfires have always occurred,” she says, but, “to some extent, we know that we are amping them up by adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere.”

This is likely, in part, why the federal government has quickly pivoted to action on COVID-19, while greenhouse gases have remained largely untouched by Congress for decades. While right-wing media and politicians denied the consequences of inaction on the virus just weeks ago, they have quickly had to change their tune as the spread of the virus has become undeniable. Whereas with long-term, gradual change, it’s easy for deniers to blame such things as the severity of the bushfires in Australia on anything but increasingly hot and arid conditions caused by climate change.

The ruling class has also had less motivation to address the climate crisis because the people suffering the most are, disproportionately, already marginalized. Poor, Black and health-compromised people are and will be the hardest hit by both crises — and some are already being affected by both at once. Air pollution is continually one of the most pronounced issues of environmental justice, and physicians have said those with continual exposure to air pollution are likely to be more vulnerable to the effects of coronavirus……..

“Coronavirus has made so clear that global issues can’t be easily categorized as just a health issue or just an environmental issue,” says says Kristina Dahl, a senior climate scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists. “They really encompass our broader economy and encompass or entire social systems and ways of life.”  ….. https://truthout.org/articles/coronavirus-shows-us-what-our-future-could-look-like-during-climate-crisis/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=5e383daa-77a3-48e3-a6f5-f82b689f50fc

March 30, 2020 Posted by | 2 WORLD, climate change, health | Leave a comment