Climate Change Impact on Health in Tijuana: Exploring Vulnerabilities and Injustice - Free Essay

Introduction

Notably, climate change can considerably result in adverse weather conditions that affect people's lives in several ways. The most challenging seasons are often winter and summer seasons. However, autumn can also lead to natural spikes such as a hurricane that eventually might cause flooding, death, and displacement of people. During summer seasons, the temperatures can slightly rise beyond the sustainable levels, to further facilitate the effects of drought, due to the intense temperatures that cause heatwaves, and greenhouse effects. According to the World Weather Forecasting Report in 2019, the Tijuana region faces a longer duration of the summer season, with a shorter winter season (Alley et al., 2019). Winter is when an area experiences cold weather conditions of temperatures that do not surpass 5 degrees F. According to this report, the average temperatures of the Tijuana border region throughout the year range from 41- to 87-degree Faraday (Alley et al., 2019). However, it was noted that for more than half a year, the temperature did not go below 53 degrees Fahaday. This data implies that the Tijuana region faces a warm season in the most proportion of the year.

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It is imperative to note that the people within the Tijuana border region are more likely to struggle with the challenge of heart-related problems during the warm weather season. Scientists, researchers, and health professionals have outstandingly described the cause and effect of heart-related diseases such as hypertension in hot weather conditions or exposure to warm weather for a prolonged time. According to Kneebone et al. (2011), high temperatures increase the risk of getting affected by strokes. These authors further postulated that the heart is usually fighting to help keep the rest of the body organs in a balanced state, regardless of the external weather conditions. Thus, exposure to high temperatures causes an acceleration of the heartbeat rate, as it attempts to reduce the heat, leading to the problem of high blood pressure. Therefore, this study will accurately evaluate the weather conditions of the Tijuana border region in San Diego, and then determine how individuals and communities are prone to getting affected by heart diseases due to high temperatures resulting from the region’s climatic changes.

Low-Income Communities in San Diego and Their Struggle with Heart Problems

The extent of public health consequences due to climate change can vary from one region to another depending on various factors such as social status, and age. In the Tijuana border region, there are several communities with families who typically survive below the poverty line. In San Diego, the average income for a family should be $63, 400. According to the American Community Survey (ACS), the most extremely concentrated poverty communities in San Diego reside south of Interstate 8 (Kneebone et al., 2011). This includes but is not restricted to Del Mar, Carmel Valley, and Leucadia. Besides, El Cajon and Escondido are additional lower-income communities from the western side of San Diego (Kneebone et al., 2011). Even though the probability of contracting heart diseases due to the region's warm weather is balanced between communities devoid of social status and age, these factors exert more significant disparities when describing how a particular community is likely to cope with the consequences than another. A family that struggles to make ends meet by attempting to provide all the necessities and necessities required in the household will find it challenging to seek medications when their members have high blood pressure (Sánchez Rodríguez & Morales Santos, 2018).

Moreover, most of the individuals in high-income communities have personated physicians who do regular medical checkups to keep their health status at a stable state. As a result, these people will quickly identify heart problems upon their start and address them before they become fatal. Nonetheless, people from low-income families will rarely afford to hire family physicians. According to the World Health Report (2018), most people die from heart problems not because of poor medications or the disease complexity, but because of late submission for medical attention. Early diagnosis and treatment are some of the most effective plans for controlling heart-related illnesses (Benjamin et al. 2017). Increased climate changes will impact these communities, and more people are likely to lose their lives due to heart failure, and hypertension disorders.

Most Vulnerable People in the Region, and Their Demographics

Concerning income disparities in the Tijuana border region, other categories of people who are more vulnerable to the impacts of heart problems are the older population above 65 years, young children below 18 years, and people with pre-existing disorders. These people are said to be more vulnerable because of their less tendency or potential to individually fight the diseases. According to the statistical results from the American Community Survey (ACS), the Tijuana region in San Diego has about 21% of children below 18 years, and nearly 12% of its population are aged above 65 (Clement & Miramontes, 2019). The World Health Organization (2018) also reported that one out of five patients who went for medication in the Tijuana medical centers had pre-existing conditions of other illnesses such as hepatitis, or HIV/AIDS. Meanwhile, it was not surprising to identify that the employment rate in the communities within Tijuana, was at 48%, with 90% of them falling in-between 35 and 50 years of age. Furthermore, the region has about 40.5% Hispanics. 75% of the employed were Hispanics, and 10% were whites (Clement & Miramontes, 2019).

Based on the same report, it was found that 80% of the attending patients were minor racial groups like blacks and Asian Americans with an infinite share of employment opportunities. In a nutshell, it can be summarized using these demographics, that the stated categories as the most vulnerable will continue to suffer as the effects of climate change continue to soar. This is because most of them have lower income that does not allow them to present at the medical centers for regular screening and checkups. Older people above 65 and young children are no longer in the employment age bracket; hence they will continue to suffer from other health problems (Clement & Miramontes, 2019). When the warm weather conditions extend, they will potentially be subjected to hypertension because of their weaker immunity.

Evidence for Climate Injustice and Extent of Vulnerabilities in the Region

In summary, this research provides a shred of consistent and outstanding evidence for the existence of climate injustice in the Tijuana border region. In an ideal state of living, everyone would be at par in terms of financial stability; hence they will seek medication to prevent and eliminate further health complications. However, the research provides a concept that this ideal state is absent in the Tijuana region, as people are divided with a wide gap of income disparity. With this kind of continued exponential exposure and vulnerability of some categories to the impacts of climate change, there is a scientific projection that the future generation in Tijuana will primarily consist of individuals from high-income communities at a higher percentage than those from low-income communities. This is because, the highly vulnerable people are not only affected by heart illnesses but equally with other health disorders, which makes it cumbersome for them to have the same survival rates as their peers from high-income communities. Therefore, there is no doubt in saying that these demographics have a shorter lifespan, and increased hot temperatures in the region might further steepen the curve or projections.

References

Benjamin, E. J., Blaha, M. J., Chiuve, S. E., Cushman, M., Das, S. R., Deo, R., ... & Isasi, C. R. (2017). Heart disease and stroke statistics—2017 update. https://stacks.cdc.gov/view/cdc/45425

Clement, N. C., & Miramontes, E. Z. (Eds.). (2019). San Diego-Tijuana in transition: A regional analysis. SCERP and IRSC publications. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=mjbT3V6mYv0C&oi=fnd&pg=PR5&dq=demographics+at+San+Diego+Tijuana&ots=U5airf07Em&sig=DI38tImMkmUjclV9p2EgtvCmWxw

Kneebone, E., Nadeau, C., & Berube, A. (2011). The re-emergence of concentrated poverty. The Brookings Institution Metropolitan Opportunity Series. http://www.interestingreads.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/brookings-poverty-report.pdf

Sánchez Rodríguez, R. A., & Morales Santos, A. E. (2018). Vulnerability assessment to climate variability and climate change in Tijuana, Mexico. Sustainability, 10(7), 2352. https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/10/7/2352

World Health Organization. (2018). WHO expert consultation on rabies: third report (Vol. 1012). World Health Organization. https://books.google.com/books?hl=en&lr=&id=-nKyDwAAQBAJ&oi=fnd&pg=PR7&dq=world+health+organization+report+2018&ots=UpmLhtXJnK&sig=ijIVgoqeIsuxkGdxDxURGN3rupE

Alley, R. B., Emanuel, K. A., & Zhang, F. (2019). Advances in weather prediction. Science, 363(6425), 342-344. https://science.sciencemag.org/content/363/6425/342.summary