Solar geoengineering could redistribute malaria risk in developing countries
Open accessPreprint — published as 10.1038/s41467-022-29613-w
Abstract
Abstract Solar geoengineering is often framed as a stopgap measure to decrease the magnitude, impacts, and injustice of climate change. However, the costs or benefits of geoengineering for human health are largely unknown. We project how geoengineering could impact malaria risk by comparing transmission suitability and populations-at-risk today against moderate and high emissions scenarios (RCP 4.5 and 8.5) with and without geoengineering over the next half-century. We show that if geoengineering deployment cools the tropics, it could help protect high elevation populations in eastern Africa from the encroachment of malaria, but could increase transmission in lowland sub-Saharan Africa and southern Asia. Compared to extreme warming, we also find that by 2070, geoengineering would nullify a projected reduction of nearly one billion people at risk of malaria. Our results indicate that geoengineering strategies designed to offset warming are not guaranteed to unilaterally improve health outcomes, and could produce regional trade-offs among Global South countries that are often excluded from geoengineering conversations.
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SAI-induced reductions in monsoon rainfall may increase cholera risk, and temperature changes can affect transmission of vector-borne diseases like malaria.
“SAI-induced reductions in monsoon rainfall may increase cholera risk (Carlson and Trisos, 2018), and temperature changes can affect transmission of vector borne diseases like malaria (Carlson and Trisos, 2018; Carlson et al., 2020).”
From A Fate Worse Than Warming? Stratospheric Aerosol Injection and Global Catastrophic Risk (2021) · cites this paper as Carlson et al., 2020
SAI-induced temperature changes and uncertain regional climatic effects can alter disease transmissions.
“SAI induced temperature changes and uncertain regional climatic effects can alter disease transmissions (Carlson and Trisos, 2018; Carlson et al., 2020).”
From A Fate Worse Than Warming? Stratospheric Aerosol Injection and Global Catastrophic Risk (2021) · cites this paper as Carlson et al., 2020
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- Trisos, C. H., Gabriel, C., Robock, A. & Xia, L. in Resilience 291-303 (Elsevier, 2018).
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A Fate Worse Than Warming? Stratospheric Aerosol Injection and Global Catastrophic Risk
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- Authors
- Carlson, C. J., Colwell, R., Hossain, M. S., Rahman, M. M., Robock, A., Ryan, S. J., Alam, M. S., & Trisos, C. H.
- Affiliations
- Georgetown University Medical Center (US)
- University of Maryland, College Park (US)
- International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research (BD)
- TH Köln - University of Applied Sciences (DE)
- Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey (US)
- University of Florida (US)
- University of Cape Town (ZA)
- Corresponding author
- Carlson, Colin J.
- Trisos, Christopher H.
- ORCID
- Venue
- medRxiv
- Publisher
- openRxiv
- Published
- 2020-10-25
- Volume
- 13
- Issue
- 1
- Pages
- 2150-2150
- ISSN
- 2041-1723 (ISSN-L)
- PMC
- PMC9021229
- OpenAlex
- W4226067188
- Cited by
- 49
- References
- 56
- Citations by year
- 2026: 10 · 2025: 9 · 2024: 14 · 2023: 10 · 2022: 5 · 2021: 1
- FWCI
- 3.78
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- cc-by
- Locations
- Nature Communications (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- medRxiv (acceptedVersion, cc-by-nc-nd)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
- Greater South Information System
- Funders
- National Science Foundation (2017113, 1617844)
- Government of the United Kingdom
- Royal Society
- International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research, Bangladesh
- African Academy of Sciences
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Climate Change and Geoengineering
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis › Climate Change and Health Impacts
- Health Sciences › Medicine › Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health › Malaria Research and Control
- Keywords
- solar geoengineering, malaria risk, malaria transmission, climate change mitigation, greenhouse gas emissions scenarios, RCP scenarios, sub-Saharan Africa, East Africa, South Asia, Global South
- MeSH terms
- Africa, Eastern, Developing Countries, Humans, Malaria, Sunlight, Climate Change
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