One 2017 research paper published in Geophysical Research Letters noted that incidents of Valley Fever ballooned by over 800 percent from 2000 to 2011. In two geographical areas with high concentrations of the infection, dust storms where "found to better correlated with the disease than any other known controlling factor."
Solis remembers when water surged into her Lucky Drive neighborhood in January as storms and King Tides swelled nearby Corte Madera Creek. "Things got bad quickly," she said. "There were no signs from the city or county about flooding. We had no idea it was going to get that bad."
A new report published by Swarmed, a resource for bee removal and a tracking network of more than 10,000 beekeepers, found that this year's swarm season began an average of 17 days earlier than last year nationwide. In Bay Area counties, including San Francisco, San Mateo and Marin, some swarms arrived more than a month ahead of schedule. But bee experts think Swarmed's four-year dataset needs additional time to establish a trend.
Sea levels are just the start of how climate change will upend the ocean. Rising temperatures are also threatening a critical artery that runs through the ocean known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC. This current, in short, sends warm water northwards and dumps colder water southwards in a giant loop, massively influencing the world's weather systems along the way.
“You can really tell the difference in products that have chocolate. They've decreased the chocolate and increased the sugar, likely [because] it's less expensive.”
Over the past century, humanity has achieved extraordinary gains in human health. Advances in water and sanitation, maternal and child care, infectious disease control, vaccinations, and other public health achievements have vastly improved human longevity and quality of life, reducing global child mortality significantly and increasing life expectancy to about 71 years as of 2021 ( WHO, 2024).
She parted some creosote branches to reveal a shriveled shrub, just ankle-high. This doomed seedling was part of a National Park Service planting effort to replace dozens of Joshua trees cut down by a Southern California Edison contractor tasked with protecting the company's power lines. But of the 193 babies planted here roughly five years ago, only 27, or 14%, are still alive, according to the Park Service. If researchers don't figure out why so few survived, an imperiled icon of the California desert may disappear even more quickly.
