At Risk
2 years, 9 months, 26 days, 4 hours
27 September 2026
I wonder at what point someone in the next generation will wish to bring a charge of crimes against humanity to those in this generation whose words and actions ignorantly and maliciously made the situation so much worse.
‘Ignorant and malicious’ was how ‘The Economist’ this week described the US President’s latest assertion that climate change was a fabrication, at the UN General Assembly in New York.
Strong words, but arguably not nearly strong enough. Only a few days before, the Energy Policy Institute of the University of Chicago published a short paper, 451,000 at Risk, projecting that this year’s Super El Niño will lead to at least that number of excess deaths.
A degree of caution is needed - the paper is not peer reviewed - but the underlying methodology is uncontroversial, based on the projected higher temperatures this year (1.2 degrees Celsius above normal causing 44% more extremely hot days) and precedent correlation of higher temperatures and mortality.
The number sounds large but in the context of global annual causes of mortality it mid-ranks, lying between the number who die as a result of murder and malaria. Most large wars have led to deaths in the millions, including the current war in Ukraine whose death toll is estimated at over 2 million, though over multiple years.
And that is where the stance of the US president (and other climate deniers in positions of power) is so dangerous. Every day that action on climate change is frustrated, directly or by influence on others, the human cost mounts up for decades into the future.
Out of curiosity I looked up the definition in Wikipedia of Crimes against humanity. They are ‘part of a large-scale attack against civilians’, and ‘can be committed during both peace and war and war and against a state’s own nationals as well as foreign nationals.’
It seems to me the definition fits. I wonder at what point someone in the next generation will wish to bring a charge of crimes against humanity to those in this generation whose words and actions ignorantly and maliciously made the situation so much worse.