Climate change – “How did it get so late so soon?”
Abstract
I do not believe that Theodor Geisel (Dr Seuss) was referring to climate change when he wrote: “How did it get so late so soon? It’s night before it’s afternoon….” 1950
“Suddenly” man-made climate change is impacting our world, and the understanding that everyone’s carbon footprint needs to drastically decrease, is a constant topic. In 1989, nitrous oxide (N2O) was the first anaesthetic gas implicated in the “greenhouse gas (GHG) effect and ozone depletion”. Halogenated hydrocarbon vapours (halothane, enflurane and isoflurane) were also mentioned at that time, but thought to be too shortacting to be significant.1 However, in 2010 a landmark article by cosmologist Sulbaek Anderson et al. published in the British Journal of Anaesthesia (BJA), equated anaesthetic vapours to Global Warming Potentials (GWP).2
Downloads
Published
Issue
Section
License
By submitting manuscripts to SAJAA, authors of original articles are assigning copyright to the SA Society of Anaesthesiologists. Authors may use their own work after publication without written permission, provided they acknowledge the original source. Individuals and academic institutions may freely copy and distribute articles published in SAJAA for educational and research purposes without obtaining permission.
The work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial Works 4.0 South Africa License. The SAJAA does not hold itself responsible for statements made by the authors.