More rural Australians will suffer mosquito-borne diseases and food poisoning as climate change causes temperatures to rise, an academic warns.
Professor Kevin Parton, from Charles Sturt University in Orange, NSW, said rural Australians will be harder hit by climate change than their metropolitan counterparts, as health services are more difficult to access in the country.
"Most of indigenous Australians live in remote regions and they could (also) be more vulnerable as a result of global warming," Professor Parton said.
Professor Parton predicted mosquito-borne diseases such as Ross River Virus will increase, in a co-authored article published in the latest edition of the Australian Journal of Rural Health.
"As vectors that support and carry diseases, such as air, water and organic movement, shift in response to climate change, so too will health problems," he said.
"We could see both a worsening of existing diseases as well as the spread of diseases usually associated with warmer regions, such as Ross River and Barmah Forest viral infections, move to more temperate climates."
Cases of food poisoning would climb as the mercury rises, as would deaths caused by weather extremes such as heatwaves and storms, Professor Parton said.
He has applied for federal government funding to conduct further research into the health, agricultural and economic effects of climate change in areas such as the Atherton Tablelands in northern Queensland and Dubbo in central NSW.
