VOA慢速英语--联合国机构:天气灾害变得更加普遍和昂贵

UN Agency: Weather Disasters Becoming More Common and Costly¹

The number of disasters driven by climate change, such as floods and heatwaves, have increased by five times over the past 50 years. Such disasters have killed more than 2 million people and cost governments $3.64 trillion since 1979.

A United Nations agency reported the findings Wednesday.

The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) says its "Atlas²" is the most complete examination ever of death and economic losses from weather, water and climate extremes.

The agency looked at about 11,000 disasters that took place between 1970-2019. They included major catastrophes⁴ such as Ethiopia's period of extreme dry weather in 1983. The drought killed more than 300,000 people and was the single most deadly event the WMO looked at. Also included was Hurricane Katrina, which struck the United States in 2005. That disaster was the most costly included in the report, with losses of $163.6 billion.

The agency said the growing number of major disasters was due to both climate change and improved disaster reporting.

WMO Secretary-General Petteri Taalas told reporters Wednesday: "Thanks to our early warning service improvement we have been able to have a decrease of the casualties at these kind of events, but the bad news is that the economic losses have been growing very rapidly and this growth is supposed to continue."

The report's findings add to evidence that extreme weather events are becoming more common due to climate change.

Costs from the events also rose from $175.4 billion in the 1970s to $1.38 trillion in the 2010s.

While disasters became more costly and common, the yearly death toll⁵ has fallen from more than 50,000 in the 1970s to around 18,000 in the 2010s. Such findings suggest that better planning efforts are working.

The WMO hopes the report will be used to help governments develop policies to better protect people.

More than 91 percent of the 2 million deaths occurred in developing countries, the report said. The report noted⁶ that only half of the WMO's 193 members have complex early warning systems.

It also said that "severe gaps" in weather observations, especially in Africa, were making early warning systems less effective.

Mami Mizutori is head of the U.N. office for disaster risk reduction. She urged the world's major economies to help hard-hit developing countries pay for warning systems and risk modeling.

Words in This Story

catastrophe³ - n. a terrible disaster

hurricane - n. an extremely large, powerful, and destructive storm with very strong winds that occurs especially in the western part of the Atlantic Ocean

casualty -n. a person who is hurt or killed during an accident, war, etc.

rapidly - adj. happening in a short amount of time: happening quickly

death toll -n. the number of people who are killed or injured in an accident, disaster, war, etc. — usually singular

occur - v. to happen

gap - n. a missing part

1 costly   

adj.昂贵的，价值高的，豪华的

参考例句：

• It must be very costly to keep up a house like this.维修这么一幢房子一定很昂贵。
• This dictionary is very useful,only it is a bit costly.这本词典很有用，左不过贵了些。

2 atlas   

n.地图册，图表集

参考例句：

• He reached down the atlas from the top shelf.他从书架顶层取下地图集。
• The atlas contains forty maps,including three of Great Britain.这本地图集有40幅地图，其中包括3幅英国地图。

3 catastrophe   

n.大灾难，大祸

参考例句：

• I owe it to you that I survived the catastrophe.亏得你我才大难不死。
• This is a catastrophe beyond human control.这是一场人类无法控制的灾难。

4 catastrophes   

n.灾祸( catastrophe的名词复数 )；灾难；不幸事件；困难

参考例句：

• Two of history's worst natural catastrophes occurred in 1970. 1970年发生了历史上最严重两次自然灾害。 来自辞典例句
• The Swiss deposits contain evidence of such catastrophes. 瑞士的遗址里还有这种灾难的证据。 来自辞典例句

5 toll   

n.过路(桥)费；损失，伤亡人数；v.敲(钟)

参考例句：

• The hailstone took a heavy toll of the crops in our village last night.昨晚那场冰雹损坏了我们村的庄稼。
• The war took a heavy toll of human life.这次战争夺去了许多人的生命。

6 noted   

adj.著名的，知名的

参考例句：

• The local hotel is noted for its good table.当地的那家酒店以餐食精美而著称。
• Jim is noted for arriving late for work.吉姆上班迟到出了名。