Rising sea levels are already prompting some low-level island communities to evacuate. 

The Guna people of Panama are moving away from their ancestral homeland of the San Blas Islands, Oceana reports. Rising waters, prompted by climate change, has combined with degraded coral reefs: 

The sad tale of the Guna, who are currently managing their retreat to mainland Panama, provides a cautionary tale of how climate change and poor resource management can combine to create disaster. But it isn’t just the direct exploitation of coral that threatens so many similar tropical, predominantly poor, coastal communities around the world. Coral reefs of the sort that once surrounded the San Blas Islands are under threat worldwide from carbon dioxide emissions that, when absorbed by the ocean, make it more acidic. When corals struggle in the more acidic water so too does the kaleidoscopic variety of life that depends on them. These once flourishing paradises may become barren monuments to changing ocean chemistry.

Read the full story here: In Panama, A Sad Retreat from the Rising Sea

The Maldives are facing the same threat: 

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