A recent USA Today article examined how climate change is causing diseases to spread to new areas in the U.S., meaning more people are at risk to contract these diseases.
These diseases include Valley Fever, an infection know as the “brain-eating amoeba” and tick-borne illnesses. According to the story, the diseases spread to new areas that are facing changes in their traditional climates.
Sonia Altizer, an associate professor in the Odum School of Ecology, told the paper that America’s public health system likely could protect people from the spread of these illnesses but it will be costly.
She told USA Today, “We really have to ask ourselves: How much harder we’ll have to fight to keep diseases out of this country as the climate warms.”
