1. Heat and health in Antwerp under climate change: Projected impacts and implications for prevention.
- Author
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Martinez GS, Diaz J, Hooyberghs H, Lauwaet D, De Ridder K, Linares C, Carmona R, Ortiz C, Kendrovski V, Aerts R, Van Nieuwenhuyse A, and Bekker-Nielsen Dunbar M
- Subjects
- Belgium, Cities, Forecasting, Hospitalization, Humans, Mortality, Seasons, Climate Change, Environmental Health, Hot Temperature
- Abstract
Background: Excessive summer heat is a serious environmental health problem in several European cities. Heat-related mortality and morbidity is likely to increase under climate change scenarios without adequate prevention based on locally relevant evidence., Methods: We modelled the urban climate of Antwerp for the summer season during the period 1986-2015, and projected summer daily temperatures for two periods, one in the near (2026-2045) and one in the far future (2081-2100), under the Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 8.5. We then analysed the relationship between temperature and mortality, as well as with hospital admissions for the period 2009-2013, and estimated the projected mortality in the near future and far future periods under changing climate and population, assuming alternatively no acclimatization and acclimatization based on a constant threshold percentile temperature., Results: During the sample period 2009-2013 we observed an increase in daily mortality from a maximum daily temperature of 26°C, or the 89th percentile of the maximum daily temperature series. The annual average heat-related mortality in this period was 13.4 persons (95% CI: 3.8-23.4). No effect of heat was observed in the case of hospital admissions due to cardiorespiratory causes. Under a no acclimatization scenario, annual average heat-related mortality is multiplied by a factor of 1.7 in the near future (24.1deaths/year CI 95%: 6.78-41.94) and by a factor of 4.5 in the far future (60.38deaths/year CI 95%: 17.00-105.11). Under a heat acclimatization scenario, mortality does not increase significantly in the near or in the far future., Conclusion: These results highlight the importance of a long-term perspective in the public health prevention of heat exposure, particularly in the context of a changing climate, and the calibration of existing prevention activities in light of locally relevant evidence., (Copyright © 2017. Published by Elsevier Ltd.)
- Published
- 2018
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