BCT Editorial – 3/7/07

This page was last updated on March 8, 2007.

A matter of degrees; Editorial; Beaver County Times; March 7, 2007.

Below is a detailed critique of the subject editorial.

“A degree here, a degree there, and pretty soon you’re talking environmental catastrophe.

“Events unfolding in the frigid water of Port William Sound in Alaska illustrate this dramatically.

“The Los Angeles Times reports a dangerous microbe (Vibrio parahaemolyticus) that normally infects seafood taken from warmer waters such as the Gulf of Mexico has made its way to Port William Sound.

“It didn’t take much of a temperature switch to make an environmental difference. The paper reports the sound’s temperature has gone up 1.4 degrees over the last 150 years.

“However, that was enough to push the water temperature in the sound to 59 degrees, which was warm enough to support the microbe. After cruise ship passengers who had eaten local oysters came down with diarrhea, vomiting and cramping in 2004, oystermen in the sound had to shut down operations.

“They have since been able to resume harvesting oysters. However, Alaska requires that more testing be done in some areas, the paper reported.

“Incidents such as this one are happening around the globe. A World Health Organization report attributed an estimated 254,000 deaths worldwide in 2000 to disease outbreaks and other conditions sparked by climate change.

“The skeptics and cynics can scoff all they want, but the dangers of climate change are too real to be ignored. Just ask the Port William oystermen and the cruise-ship passengers who ate their oysters.”

[RWC] “The skeptics and cynics” of what? Global warming or manmade global warming? It appears the Times believes they are one and the same. I distrust people who don’t recognize there’s a difference.