Encouraging reduced use of fossil fuels by making them more expensive will result in less air pollution, reducing the health impacts of both air pollution and climate change.
It is very clear that pollution causes harm. Oxford Reference defines it as “contamination or undesirable modification of soil, food, water, clothing, or the atmosphere by a noxious or toxic substance,” adding that “any form of pollution can have adverse effects on health.”
All of these impacts have an economic cost. Broadly speaking, direct human costs are measured in the value of lives lost, the cost of treating pollution-related illness and the lost production due to sickness-related work absence. Unlike air pollution, which is mainly a local condition with direct effects on health, the health costs of the carbon dioxide emissions that are the target of carbon pricing are experienced world-wide and indirectly.
Food production, cost and availability will be affected by changes in our agricultural systems due to drought or flooding and changes in the distribution and availability of fish. We can expect to see millions of eco-refugees — many of them experiencing malnutrition and starvation — as large areas become unfit for habitation due to heat, desertification, rising sea levels and the like.
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