RGA Re has published a whitepaper entitled Clearing the Air: The conundrum of climate change and the impacts on health, examining the many factors insurers should consider and steps they should take to make more informed decisions in the face of climate change.
Specifically, the report suggests insurers consult a growing area of climate study which deals in probability, observability and validity known as attribution science, to help quantify the impacts of climate change. Those in the relatively new field are currently analyzing extreme weather events.
Critical and challenging
“For life and health insurers, identifying approaches to better quantify and predict the impacts of climate change is both critical and challenging,” the report states, adding that 2023 was the hottest year on record globally, by a large margin. Several indicators of global warming, including sea-levels, glacier retreat and sea ice loss and ocean temperatures also set records in 2023.
The report asks if the year was simply a bad one, or if climate change has entered a dangerous new phase: “Fueling the debate is an inability to answer this question with a high degree of certainty,” they write. “For the insurance industry, which exists to protect people against uncertainty, identifying approaches to better quantify and predict the impacts of climate change is essential. For life and health insurers in particular, this means taking the next step and determining the health implications of rising global temperatures.”
Carcinogens in wildfire smoke
The report goes on to look at a number of metrics (human exposure to days of very high or extremely high fire danger increased in 61 per cent of the world’s countries between the 2001 to 2004 and 2018 to 2021 study periods), the carcinogens found in wildfire smoke, incidence of lung cancer around the world (air pollution is estimated to cause seven million premature deaths every year), hurricane intensification and flooding. It also looks at the limitations of available research, and the need for a long-term approach to analysis.
“Environmental perils are clearly emerging as leading morbidity and mortality drivers worldwide and climate change could further affect these trends,” they write.
