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HARVARD MEDICAL INSURANCE EXPERTS TELL MEMBERS OF CONGRESS THAT PUBLIC HEALTH INSURANCE RISKS OF GLOBAL WARMING ARE HERE ALREADY

WASHINGTON, D.C.—June 18, 2003
Far from being a hypothetical concern for future generations, global warming already is a front-burner issue in the public health and financial sectors (particularly the insurance industry), according to a briefing delivered today on Capitol Hill by experts from the Harvard Medical School and Swiss Re. The pair told U.S. House and Senate members that new "outbreaks" of health problems, including asthma and West Nile Virus, and a palpable danger of added insurance risks and costs mean that climate-change issues must be addressed now.

Dr. Paul R. Epstein, M.D., associate director, Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School said, "Concerns about climate change are often mistakenly placed into the distant future. But as the rate of climate change increases, so do the biological responses and costs associated with warming and unstable weather. The influence of intensifying droughts on the spread of West Nile virus in the U.S. and the impacts of rising carbon dioxide (CO2) levels on allergies and asthma demonstrate that global warming has come into our backyards."

Dr. Epstein also told the members of Congress, "The intense weather extremes associated with warming of the atmosphere and oceans create conditions favorable to 'clusters' of disease outbreaks. Large outbreaks of West Nile virus (WNV) in the U.S. and Europe are associated with drought, and prolonged droughts have become more frequent with global warming. WNV affects humans directly and the impacts on wildlife have long term implications for the global emergence and resurgence of infectious diseases."

"Today, climate change as a financial issue is very much underestimated from the point of view of the insurance and reinsurance industry's potentially rising costs and risks," said Christopher T. Walker, managing director, Greenhouse Gas Risk Solutions, Financial Services Business Group, Swiss Re. "Carbon is becoming a tradable commodity, allowing companies to hedge their risks, profit from emissions assets and turn this new discipline into a competitive advantage."

Walker added, "So, in additional to potential liabilities for corporations from greenhouse gas emissions reductions, there also are business opportunities where the financial industry and, in particular, the insurance industry can be the prime mover of emissions reduction activities. The reality here is simple: insurance and reinsurance companies have the potential to become prime catalysts for the development of renewables, emission reduction and energy-efficient technologies for two reasons: such steps will reduce risks and open up new and lucrative lines of business activity."

The Capitol Hill sponsors of the Harvard Medical School/Swiss Re briefing were:   Senator James M. Jeffords (I-VT), Congressman Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), Congressman John Olver (D-MA), Congresswoman Barbara Lee (D-CA) and Congressman Wayne Gilchrest (R-MD).

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ABOUT THE PRESENTERS:
Dr. Paul R. Epstein, MPH, is associate director of the Center for Health and the Global Environment at Harvard Medical School (www.med.harvard.edu/chge), and is a medical doctor trained in tropical public health. Dr. Epstein has worked in medical, teaching and research capacities in Africa, Asia and Latin America and, in 1993, coordinated an eight-part series on Health and Climate Change for the British medical journal, Lancet. He has worked with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the National Academy of Sciences, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) to assess the health impacts of climate change and develop health applications of climate forecasting and remote sensing.

Christopher T. Walker is an attorney and the managing director of Swiss Re's Greenhouse Gas Risk Solutions. There, he has developed risk finance/transfer solutions to facilitate the use of the market mechanisms and established the Competence for GHG technical expertise and issue training/education. Mr. Walker organized and conducted a series of well attended and highly acclaimed "Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions" conferences at Rüschlikon, Switzerland in October 2001 and 2002 and New York in July 2002. He is a member of the advisory board for the Center for Economic and Environmental Partnership, Inc. (CEEP) - Energy Performance Project (EP2), member of the Connecticut Climate Change Stakeholder Dialogue for Governor Rowland's Climate Change Steering Committee, corporate representative for the World Resource Institute's Safe Climate, Sound Business Solutions in the Northeast, the Emissions Marketing Association and various environmental NGOs. Mr. Walker received his BA in Government from St. John's University, and is also a graduate of the St. John's School of Law.

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ABOUT THE GROUPS:
The Center for Health and the Global Environment (www.med.harvard.edu/chge) at the Harvard Medical School was founded in 1996 at Harvard Medical School to expand environmental education at medical schools and to further investigate and promote awareness of the human health consequences of global environmental change. The Center administers a course at Harvard Medical School entitled "Human Health and Global Environmental Change." The course is taught by scientific experts from around the world and is open to the public as well as students from Harvard Medical School, Harvard School of Public Health, and other university students in the Boston area. The course has also been taught at 23 medical schools in the U.S. (cover 18 percent of all U.S. medical students) and three international medical schools via videotape and online videos. The Center publishes an online publication entitled The Quarterly Review. An edition of The Review, The Congressional Review, is distributed to every member of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate by Congressman Sherwood Boehlert and Senator John Kerry. The Center also educates policy-makers by holding briefings and seminars on human health and the global environment on Capital Hill.

Greenhouse Gas Risk Solutions (GHGRS) (www.swissre.com/emissions) is the Swiss Re unit charged with developing business opportunities in the emerging Greenhouse Gas emissions reduction area. GHGRS consists of four specialists who examine business opportunities across a wide spectrum of financial service products including insurance, structured finance, third-party asset management and investments, as well as the identification of risks to Swiss Re's (re)insurance and investment activities. The Swiss Reinsurance Company was founded in Zurich in December 1863. Swiss Re does business from over 70 offices in more than 30 countries with over 8,300 employees, providing risk transfer, risk financing and asset management to its global client base. Today, the Swiss Re Group is one of the leading and financially strongest reinsurers. In the financial year 2002, gross premiums written amounted to CHF 32.7 billion.

CONTACT: Stephanie Kendall at (703) 276-3254 or skendall@hastingsgroup.com.


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