The survey also found increasing knowledge about specific health harms from climate change: 37 percent of Americans were able to identify at least one specific climate-related danger—including respiratory problems, extreme heat, pollution, and extreme weather events. That’s a 5 percent increase from 2014.
And a growing share of Americans believe that harms like heat stroke, asthma and lung disease, bodily harm from extreme weather, and hunger will be more common in their community over the next 10 years if nothing is done to address global warming.
These health risks are well documented in the US. They can strike anyone, but they often disproportionately harm vulnerable communities, including Black, brown, Indigenous, and low-income populations, people with disabilities and chronic diseases, children, the elderly, and women. Globally, the World Health Organization has estimated that climate change will cause an extra 250,000 annual deaths from 2030 to 2050 from heat stress, malnutrition, malaria, and diarrhea alone.
Maibach said the finding showing increased trust in scientists and researchers on global warming’s health impacts was a surprise, given that trust in health professionals overall plunged after the COVID-19 pandemic.
“It bucks the trend of decreasing trust overall,” Maibach said.
The finding suggests that physicians, first responders, and even climate scientists may be particularly effective vehicles for education on climate change and health harms.
For the most part, the survey reflected increased understanding of well-researched threats to human health: 65 percent of Americans believe that coal harms people’s health, and 38 percent believe natural gas does, a 9 point increase since 2018.
But the survey also found that 15 percent of Americans believe wind energy harms health and 12 percent believe the same about solar power, both increases since 2014.
Claims that wind energy or solar power are harmful to human health are unproven and many have been debunked, but they’re still being made by some government officials, fossil fuel industry groups, and media outlets.
Overall, Maibach said the survey results illustrate growing awareness that could bolster efforts to combat global warming.
“The fact that we’re seeing such a strong uptick in public understanding that climate change is harming the health of Americans, we fundamentally are optimistic that that will build the public will for climate action,” Maibach said.
This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News, a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy, and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here.
