El Niño and health

Overview

This report summarises the impacts of El Niño on health and the potential uses of such information. The first section provides background information on the nature of the ENSO phenomenon and the second section describes its impact on world climate in the form of weather-related disasters such as hurricanes and tropical storms, floods, drought and forest/bush fires. Section three summarises the current state of knowledge on the health impacts of El Niño.

The relationship between weather-related events and health outcomes is explored with an evaluation of the epidemiological and biological evidence. Section four addresses the potential for seasonal (El Niño) forecasting and the issues in disseminating such forecasts to those who need to know, especially within the health sector. Section five describes some current international initiatives related to ENSO and climate change and section six discusses the conclusions of the report.