Maine is not as prepared to manage the health impacts of a changing climate as other parts of the country that face far hotter and stormier futures because it lacks the experience and the infrastructure needed to deal with extreme heat and weather.

Maine will likely remain a relatively temperate place through 2100, with the average annual temperature increasing between 2 and 10 degrees Fahrenheit and precipitation between 5% and 14%, depending on various emissions scenarios, Maine State Climatologist Sean Birkel said during a virtual meeting of the Maine Climate Council on Thursday.

KeKe Samberstein and her colleagues try to stay dry as they make their way down the flooded Portland Pier at high tide after having lunch at Luke’s Lobster on February 13. Samberstein and her colleagues are visiting Portland on a work trip from New York and didn’t know about the predicted high tide flooding. Brianna Soukup/Staff Photographer

But other parts of the country facing far warmer, wetter and wilder weather futures already know how and when to set up heating or cooling stations, have neighborhood evacuation plans for interior and coastal flash floods, and have housing stock equipped with air conditioning.

“There’s a lot of room for catch-up for our adaptation and our social structures for protecting Mainers and Maine communities from health impacts of extreme heat and extreme weather,” said Rebecca Lincoln, an environmental epidemiologist at the Maine Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

That was one of the major takeaways about the changing climate’s impact on the people who live, work and play in Maine from the first of three scientific briefings about the latest update to the state’s climate action plan. The Maine Climate Council must update the plan by the end of the year.

The council doesn’t have enough data to say exactly how the higher temperatures, humidity and frequency of extreme weather expected at the end of the century will impact human health, other than to say they are likely to exacerbate certain conditions, Lincoln said.

Examples of climate-related health conditions include pregnancy, birth and pediatric complications, respiratory problems, kidney and cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and mental health problems. Extreme weather can cause injuries, hypothermia and carbon monoxide poisoning.

Many of these conditions have multiple causes, many of which are not related to the changing climate.

“We don’t have (a) good understanding of the relationship between how warm or how wet the climate has to be to produce how many more cases of depression or PTSD or how much change in wildfire smoke or pollen will produce how many asthma exacerbations or respiratory deaths,” Lincoln said.

Maine is already seeing an increase in diseases carried by hosts that survive longer or even thrive in warmer weather, such as ticks and mosquitos, Lincoln said. Deer ticks are well established in southern Maine and are expanding into northern Maine quickly.

Last year, Maine recorded a record-breaking 2,943 cases of Lyme disease.

University of Maine anthropology professor Cindy Isenhour noted that climate change is often framed as an environmental issue when it is really a story about people. People are burning the fossil fuels that create the emissions warming the planet, and people are already feeling the impact, she said.

“We’re certainly feeling the impact of climate change here in Maine as projections for increased storm severity, sea level rise, shorter winters, and more frequent high-heat events have been realized,” she said. “But if (we) caused the problem, then we are also ultimately the solution.”

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Three New Bedford men have been arrested in connection to a drug-related drive-by shooting in Saco, Maine, in February that led to an hours-long lockdown of the downtown and area schools, Maine law enforcement officials said Thursday.

Joshua “Mac” Estrada, 19, Yancarlos “Glizzy” Abrante, 20, and Jason “Ouda” Johnson-Rivera, 18, are each charged with conspiracy to distribute and posses with intent to distribute cocaine and perpetrating a drive-by shooting, according to a statement issued by the US Attorney for the District of Maine.

According to a federal indictment handed up Wednesday, the three men allegedly had been trafficking cocaine in and around Saco and Biddeford since at least January 2024, the statement said.

During a drug dispute on Feb. 9, they fired at least five rounds from a 9 mm handgun into another vehicle, according to Darcie N. McElwee, Maine’s US attorney.

“This joint federal and local investigation reflects that if you come to Maine and engage in violence, particularly firearm violence, there will be a swift and coordinated response from every level of law enforcement,” McElwee’s statement said.

The daytime shooting, just before noon in the intersection of North and Elm streets, prompted authorities to issue a shelter-in-place warning and order at least six schools to go on lockdown.

Police said gunshots were exchanged between a red Dodge Charger and a gray Honda HRV before they collided at the intersection. A school bus was involved in the crash but no students were injured.

Four people ran from the scene causing an extensive search by law enforcement, police said. One of the people appeared to have been shot in the arm.

“Brazen violent crime of this magnitude is not something the City of Saco is accustomed to, but when it happens, Maine law enforcement responds,” Chief Jack Clements, of the Saco Police Department, said in the statement.

In the immediate aftermath of the “brazen” shooting and during the “ensuing chaos,” FBI agents with the Southern Maine Gang Task Force hit the ground running, Jodi Cohen, the FBI’s special agent in charge of the Boston division (which includes all of Maine), said in the statement.

“We believe the three Massachusetts men we have in custody conspired with each other to traffic cocaine and were the instigators of this drive-by shooting,” Cohen said. “Violent drug traffickers have a corrosive effect on our communities, and we want everyone to know that the FBI is committed to working with our law enforcement partners to help make Maine safer for the folks who live, work, and visit here.”

Before the indictment, Estrada was arrested May 6 in New Bedford via a criminal complaint. He was arraigned Thursday in federal court in Maine, McElwee said.

Abrante and Johnson-Rivera currently are in custody in Massachusetts on unrelated charges, McElwee said. They will be brought to Maine next week to be arraigned on the new charges, McElwee said.

If convicted as charged, each of the men faces a maximum of 20 years in prison on the drug charge and up to 25 years imprisonment on the shooting charge, McElwee said.

McElwee announced the arrests Thursday at a press briefing outside the Edward T. Gignoux US Courthouse in Portland. She was joined by Clements, fellow prosecutors, FBI and ATF agents, and acting US Marshal Kevin Neal.

Tonya Alanez can be reached at tonya.alanez@globe.com. Follow her @talanez.