PROVIDENCE, R.I. (Brown University) — The National Institute on Aging awards a $3.8 million grant to researchers at Brown University School of Public Health to establish a center to study the negative health effects of climate change on an aging population. I gave it.
Alan Just, associate professor of public health and environment and society at Brown University, said the health risks posed by extreme weather events due to climate change are especially acute for older adults and people with chronic health conditions. .
“The goal of this center is to build adaptation strategies that improve the resilience of aging populations regionally and nationally to the impacts of climate change,” he said. “We aim to develop practical solutions that promote healthy aging for everyone.”
The new Center for Climate, Health, and Aging Innovation and Community Research Solutions will leverage scholarship from a variety of disciplines at Brown University, from public health to environmental science, earth science, and population research. Center leaders will work closely with Equitable Climate Futures, an academic initiative focused on building climate research capacity at Brown University, with an emphasis on under-resourced communities.
With the support of a three-year federal grant, the researchers hope to inform federal, state, and local climate and health-related policies. This includes policies focused on health care delivery, housing, energy assistance, and access to clean indoor air during wildfires and atmospheric disasters. Pollution worsens outdoor air quality. They are also conducting research on drugs that may impair thermoregulation (the process by which the body maintains its core internal temperature) and make older adults more vulnerable to extreme heat.
“We wanted to leverage Brown’s research capabilities in gerontology, particularly his experience with large Medicare datasets, and link them to environmental data on climate change,” Just said. “In this way, we can combine expertise from both fields to focus on understanding and mitigating the health impacts of climate change on older adults.”
In addition to Just, an epidemiologist with the School of Public Health and Brown University’s Institute of Environmental and Social Studies, the center’s leaders include Theresa Shireman, director of the Brown Center for Gerontology and Medical Research and professor of health services; It will be done. policy and practice. Elizabeth Fassel, professor of population studies and environment and society; and Emily Gadbois, assistant professor of health services, policy, and practice.
The center will integrate existing and new climate and aging research into work carried out by community organizations serving populations at increased risk of adverse health effects from extreme heat and air pollution.
“Working closely with our community partners, we hope to leverage this three-year project to build something bigger and build on our research findings to address broader regional, national and even global impacts. ,” Just said.
