Projections of Ambient Temperature- and Air Pollution-Related Mortality Burden Under Combined Climate Change and Populat
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SUSCEPTIBILITY FACTORS IN ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH (Z LIEW AND K POLLITT, SECTION EDITORS)
Projections of Ambient Temperature- and Air Pollution-Related Mortality Burden Under Combined Climate Change and Population Aging Scenarios: a Review Kai Chen 1,2 & Ana Maria Vicedo-Cabrera 3,4 & Robert Dubrow 1,2
# Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract Purpose of Review Climate change will affect mortality associated with both ambient temperature and air pollution. Because older adults have elevated vulnerability to both non-optimal ambient temperature (heat and cold) and air pollution, population aging can amplify future population vulnerability to these stressors through increasing the number of vulnerable older adults. We aimed to review recent evidence on projections of temperature- or air pollution-related mortality burden (i.e., number of deaths) under combined climate change and population aging scenarios, with a focus on evaluating the role of population aging in assessing these health impacts of climate change. We included studies published between 2014 and 2019 with age-specific population projections. Recent Findings We reviewed 16 temperature projection studies and 15 air pollution projection studies. Nine of the temperature studies and four of the air pollution studies took population aging into account by performing age-stratified analyses that utilized age-specific relationships between temperature or air pollution exposures and mortality (i.e., age-specific exposure-response functions (ERFs)). Population aging amplifies the projected mortality burden of temperature and air pollution under a warming climate. Compared with a constant population scenario, population aging scenarios lead to less reduction or even increases in cold-related mortality burden, resulting in substantial net increases in future overall (heat and cold) temperature-related mortality burden. Summary There is strong evidence suggesting that to accurately assess the future temperature- and air pollution-related mortality burden of climate change, investigators need to account for the amplifying effect of population aging. Thus, all future studies should incorporate age-specific population size projections and age-specific ERFs into their analyses. These studies would benefit from refinement of age-specific ERF estimates. Keywords Climate change . Population aging . Temperature . Air pollution . Mortality . Projection
This article is part of the Topical Collection on Susceptibility Factors in Environmental Health * Kai Chen [email protected] 1
Department of Environmental Health Sciences, Yale School of Public Health, 60 College Street, New Haven, CT 06520-8034, USA
2
Yale Center on Climate Change and Health, Yale School of Public Health, 60 College Street, New Haven, CT 06520-8034, USA
3
Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Bern, 43 Mittelstrasse, 3012 Bern, Switzerland
4
Oeschger Center for Climate Change Research, University of Bern, 4 Hochschulstrasse, 3012 Bern, Switzerland
Introduction Climate change
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