Following article appeared in the Cornell Chronicle! The article cites a research paper written by Cornell University researchers and others.
The research article is a piece of junk science! Again climate model predictions are being abused!
They asked local people for the reasons of drowning. Is this a scientific study of the causes of fishing related drownings? Very doubtful!
The researchers mention the lack of life jackets and navigation equipment. How about the age and maintenance of the boats? Overcrowding of boats, over fishing? Etc. etc.
"Fatal drownings are a big risk for small-scale fishers on Africa’s largest lake, with many of those deaths attributed to bad weather – conditions that are likely to worsen with climate change, according to a new study. ...
Low and moderate-income fishers fish to provide for their families, which pushes them to venture out even in poor weather conditions. ...
When fishers died during bad weather, 69.5% of them weren’t wearing life jackets and 67.5% of them lacked navigation equipment. Inability to swim and drug and alcohol use also contributed to these deaths. Motorized boats were involved in 43% of the incidents."
Low and moderate-income fishers fish to provide for their families, which pushes them to venture out even in poor weather conditions. ...
When fishers died during bad weather, 69.5% of them weren’t wearing life jackets and 67.5% of them lacked navigation equipment. Inability to swim and drug and alcohol use also contributed to these deaths. Motorized boats were involved in 43% of the incidents."
From the abstract:
"Drowning is an overlooked public health concern and drowning risk is dependent on environmental risk factors. The preponderance of drowning deaths occurs in low- and middle-income countries. Small-scale fishers face high occupational risk of drowning. Climate change increases the frequency and intensity of storms, thereby exacerbating fishers’ risks and creating a need to examine the contribution of storms to fisher drowning deaths for the development of mitigation strategies. We examined this relationship between weather and fisher drowning deaths in Lake Victoria, which is Africa’s largest lake, a site of high fishing pressure, and where climate change is predicted to increase thunderstorms. We conducted a verbal autopsy with people knowledgeable about recent fatal fisher drowning incidents to collect information about the deceased fishers and circumstances surrounding the incidents across 43 landing sites in the Kenyan shore of Lake Victoria. Semi-structured interviews with stakeholders also elucidated community perspectives on drowning risks. Fatal drownings were often attributed to bad weather (41.8%). Other risk factors, such as non-use of life jacket and navigation equipment, co-occurred with bad weather at high rates (69.5% and 67.8%, respectively) to jointly contribute to fatal drowning incidents. Such co-occurrence of risk factors indicates that actions across multiple risk factors can help mitigate the issue. Stakeholder analysis revealed a range of opportunities for improved communication of risks and action to mitigate risks across boat operators and manufacturers, as well as multiple levels of management. Across global small-scale fisheries, limited use of safety equipment and intensive fishing pressure may coincide with increases in extreme weather events, necessitating action to address current and mitigate future drowning risks to small-scale fishers."
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