Climate change, indoor environments, and health

For many of us working in the indoor air sciences, it is clear that climate change has implications to buildings beyond modifying cooling and heating demands. Thus, it is surprising that in the world of climate science and policy, so little is said about how extreme weather events and long-term climate conditions might affect health through modification of indoor environments. Even in the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report (IPCC, 2007a), there is only brief reference to indoor health risk in terms of occupational heat stress and possible co-benefits of reducing biomass fuel use. The health concerns that climate scientists have focused on include ecosystem disruption and zoopathogens, toxic algal blooms, vector-borne diseases, heat stress, crop losses, and diminished nutritional value of food. Meanwhile, the indoor environment, until recently, has not been considered.