Post on 26-Mar-2015
Climate & Health: A Toolkit?
Peter J RobinsonDepartment of Geography
Southeast Regional Climate CenterUniversity of North Carolina – Chapel Hill
Climate & Health: Background
• Multitudinous Links– Few well established– Most probably complex– Climate not always dominant driver
• Emerging Public Awareness– Public Health Awareness Week
– Increasing information needs– Climate predictions required
Objective
• Develop a climate-health impact toolkit– Simple set of broadly applicable techniques
• Match tool (types) to impact (types) – help understand science behind links– help respond to likely impacts– help with predictions– foster rapid (preliminary) response to user needs
• to emerging questions/new threats
Approach: Case study based
• Review known climate-health links– Limited range
• Incorporate other possible methods– Draw on all aspects of applied climatology
• Suggest new approaches– Literature review– Personal interactions– Graduate student input
Ambient Exposure
• Heat wave – Temperature, humidity, radiation– Heat Stress– Rapid health response
• UV exposure – Sunlight intensity, atmospheric transfer– Melanoma– Cumulative dosage response
Heat Wave – Heat Stress• Biophysical model
– Temperature, humidity, radiation, wind….
• Impact vs climate correlation– Measurements, practicality
• Index development– Applicability, understandability
• Regional Analysis– Time series, thresholds
• Forecasting
Heat Index Application
• Heat Stress Index – a simplification– U.S: Tmax, Tmin, humidity, duration
• Thresholds variable across nation
• Not time dependent
– Europe: Tmax, duration• Simple to use
• Seemingly regarded as static
• Applied to the variety of climates
• Cultural adaptation?
Ambient Exposure
• Heat wave – Temperature, humidity, radiation– Heat Stress– Rapid health response
• UV exposure – Sunlight intensity, atmospheric transfer– Melanoma– Cumulative dosage response
UV Exposure
• Culturophysical Model– Intensity/Quality + exposure time– Social “estimation” of times
• Accuracy vs Complexity– Too complex to use
• Ability to test– Time to accumulate too long
• Validity of basic method?
Transport - Diffusion
• Air pollution– Various well-established applications
• Ozone & Particulate Matter– Longer transport time– Synoptic approach
• Indoor- Outdoor: Flu– (Bio)physical transport model– Jet stream or Jet plane?
Air Pollution
• Clear target– Air pollution = generalized health/diseases
• Plume dispersion models– Well established– Refinements for topography….
• Specific Impacts?– Length/Amount of exposure
Ozone & Particulate Matter
• Longer transport time– Potentially broader dispersion
• Analyze like heat stress?– Point data misleading
• Synoptic approach– Upwind trajectory?– Speed of movement?
Charlotte NC Ozone vs Air Mass
Indoor-Outdoor Air: Flu
• More flu in winter– Seasonal = climate connection?– Viral diffusion process
• Means of diffusion– Jet stream or Jet plane?
• (Bio)physical transport model– Viral survival and transport– Scale of flu diffusion problem
Weather and Influenza: What Do We Know?
Cold air Virus is stable (remains active) Breathing cold air increases respiratory clearance More time spent indoors decreases melatonin and Vitamin D
Dry air Virus decays at a slower rate Virus remains suspended in the air Evaporation decreases size of bioaerosol to that favorable for infection
in the lower respiratory tract
Wind Bioaerosols that settle can be “kicked-up” by gusty winds Increased transport and residence time in the air
Regional Shifts
• Long-term Changes– Climate Change– Outside historical record length
• Wide area Variations– Downscale from models– Upscale from observations
Malarial Regional Shifts
• Temperature trends– Warm areas advance poleward– Suitable seasons for malarial mosquitos?– Impacts inferred from Malarial Atlas Project?
• Surface water changes– Known role of standing water in dry areas– Will warm areas get sufficiently wet?– Will seasonality influence mosquitos?
Climate – Malaria Links
• Seasonality of changed climate?– Downscale model results– Link to synoptics– Add temporal variability as random process?
• Response of mosquitos/parasites– Lifecycles under non-tropical conditions?
• Response to Urbanization– Representative of external factors
Summary of Tools
• Statistical climatology models• Synoptic Climatology approaches• Customized biophysical models• General climate models
• Ability to interlink tools• Need to link various climate factors• Awareness of other inputs