The COVID Pandemic and Climate Change: Multifactorial risk and vulnerability

Abstract

During the last Covid-19 pandemic, 333,188 people died in Mexico, when analyzing the behavior of the pandemic, it was found that the risk of dying when infected was related to their previous medical conditions, such as degenerative diseases; research was also carried out that linked them to their gender, age, work, and school condition. So far, no analysis has been carried out linking people who have died from Covid-19 to social marginalization or vulnerability to climate change. This research arises from the question: How is environmental vulnerability related as a factor that influenced the death of people who were infected by covid-19 in Mexico during the pandemic, in the years 2020 to 2023? In order to answer this research question, it is hypothesized that vulnerability to climate change is a factor that negatively affects the life expectancy of people who were infected by Covid-19 in Mexico. The objective is to make visible how environmental deterioration has a negative impact on people's health, as well as on the emergence of new pathogens, which increases the deaths of people infected by Covid-19. In order to demonstrate this research assumption, an analysis of variance was carried out by relating the variable of people who died during the pandemic with the conditions of municipal vulnerability to global climate change. The south-central states of the Mexican Republic of Puebla, Morelos, Guerrero, State of Mexico and Mexico City were selected. It was found that environmental vulnerability has a negative impact on the life expectancy of people who were infected, so if the municipality where the deceased person lived has a greater vulnerability to climate change, there was a greater probability of death. That is why environmental justice actions must be carried out to reduce vulnerability to CC.