Decatur Book Festival - Fevered | Linda Marsa

This event is free and open to the public. RSVPs are not required.
Refer to this Festival webpage (http://www.decaturbookfestival.com/2013/authors/detail.php?id=34) for the most up-to-date information.

http://photos4.meetupstatic.com/photos/event/5/0/a/c/600_271280652.jpeg Fevered: Why a Hotter Planet Will Hurt Our Health
Linda Marsa

Beyond images of emaciated polar bears and drought-cracked lakes, there remains a major part of climate change’s impact that the media has neglected - how our health will suffer from higher temperatures and extreme weather. From spiraling rates of asthma and allergies and spikes in heatstroke-related deaths - to swarms of invasive insects carrying fatal illnesses like dengue fever and West Nile to increases in heart and lung disease and cancer, the effect of rising temperatures on human health will be far-reaching, and is more imminent than we think. Growing scientific evidence shows climate change-induced health crises and the rising tide of natural disasters - hurricanes, floods, droughts - will strain the healthcare system beyond what it can support and shorten our life spans.

In her new book Fevered: Why a Hotter Planet Will Hurt Our Health award-winning journalist Linda Marsa blends compelling narrative with cutting-edge science to explore the changes in Earth’s increasingly fragile support system and provide a blueprint - a “medical Manhattan Project - detailing what we need to do to protect ourselves from this oncoming medical meltdown.

About the author
Linda Marsa is an award-winning investigative journalist and a contributing editor at Discover who has covered medicine, health and science for more than two decades. A former Los Angeles Times reporter, her work was selected for inclusion in The Best American Science Writing, 2012.

Introducer
Stephanie Stuckey Benfield, Executive Director
GreenLaw

Stephanie Stuckey Benfield is the Executive Director of GreenLaw (http://greenlaw.org/), a Georgia-based nonprofit law firm which champions the right of every Georgian to breathe clean air, drink clean water, live in healthy communities and enjoy our state’s natural beauty. Before joining Green Law in April Stephanie served for 14 years as a State Representative in the Georgia House, representing the Decatur area, where she was a vocal environmental advocate as a member of its Natural Resources Committee.