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Former Vice President Al Gore hosted a controversial Climate & Health Meeting on Thursday

Future climate change events will cause premature deaths, experts said

CNN  — 

The future is expected to hold more deadly heat waves, the fast spread of certain infectious diseases and catastrophic food shortages.

These events could cause premature deaths – and they’re all related to climate change, according to a panel of experts who gathered at the Carter Center in Atlanta on Thursday for the Climate & Health Meeting.

The Climate & Health Meeting was organized to replace the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s climate change conference, which was postponed in January, ahead of President Donald Trump’s inauguration. The Trump administration did not explicitly ask for the move, CNN reported in January.

Although Trump has said that there is “some connectivity” between human activity and climate change, he also has expressed doubts about the climate crisis.

The meeting became a subject of controversy as Trump prepared to take office last month.