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- Arisco, Nicholas J, et al.
(author)
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The effect of extreme temperature and precipitation on cause-specific deaths in rural Burkina Faso : a longitudinal study
- 2023
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In: The Lancet Planetary Health. - : Elsevier. - 2542-5196. ; 7:6, s. e478-e489
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background: Extreme weather is becoming more common due to climate change and threatens human health through climate-sensitive diseases, with very uneven effects around the globe. Low-income, rural populations in the Sahel region of west Africa are projected to be severely affected by climate change. Climate-sensitive disease burdens have been linked to weather conditions in areas of the Sahel, although comprehensive, disease-specific empirical evidence on these relationships is scarce. In this study, we aim to provide an analysis of the associations between weather conditions and cause-specific deaths over a 16-year period in Nouna, Burkina Faso.Methods: In this longitudinal study, we used de-identified, daily cause-of-death data from the Health and Demographic Surveillance System led by the Centre de Recherche en Santé de Nouna (CRSN) in the National Institute of Public Health of Burkina Faso, to assess temporal associations between daily and weekly weather conditions (maximum temperature and total precipitation) and deaths attributed to specific climate-sensitive diseases. We implemented distributed-lag zero-inflated Poisson models for 13 disease-age groups at daily and weekly time lags. We included all deaths from climate-sensitive diseases in the CRSN demographic surveillance area from Jan 1, 2000 to Dec 31, 2015 in the analysis. We report the exposure–response relationships at percentiles representative of the exposure distributions of temperature and precipitation in the study area.Findings: Of 8256 total deaths in the CRSN demographic surveillance area over the observation period, 6185 (74·9%) were caused by climate-sensitive diseases. Deaths from communicable diseases were most common. Heightened risk of death from all climate-sensitive communicable diseases, and malaria (both across all ages and in children younger than 5 years), was associated with 14-day lagged daily maximum temperatures at or above 41·1°C, the 90th percentile of daily maximum temperatures, compared with 36·4°C, the median (all communicable diseases: 41·9°C relative risk [RR] 1·38 [95% CI 1·08–1·77], 42·8°C 1·57 [1·13–2·18]; malaria all ages: 41·1°C 1·47 [1·05–2·05], 41·9°C 1·78 [1·21–2·61], 42·8°C 2·35 [1·37–4·03]; malaria younger than 5 years: 41·9°C 1·67 [1·02–2·73]). Heightened risk of death from communicable diseases was also associated with 14-day lagged total daily precipitation at or below 0·1 cm, the 49th percentile of total daily precipitation, compared with 1·4 cm, the median (all communicable diseases: 0·0 cm 1·04 [1·02–1·07], 0·1 cm 1·01 [1·006–1·02]; malaria all ages: 0·0 cm 1·04 [1·01–1·08], 0·1 cm 1·02 [1·00–1·03]; malaria younger than 5 years: 0·0 cm 1·05 [1·01–1·10], 0·1 cm 1·02 [1·00–1·04]). The only significant association with a non-communicable disease outcome was a heightened risk of death from climate-sensitive cardiovascular diseases in individuals aged 65 years and older associated with 7-day lagged daily maximum temperatures at or above 41·9°C (41·9°C 2·25 [1·06–4·81], 42·8°C 3·68 [1·46–9·25]). Over 8 cumulative weeks, we found that the risk of death from communicable diseases was heightened at all ages from temperatures at or above 41·1°C (41·1°C 1·23 [1·05–1·43], 41·9°C 1·30 [1·08–1·56], 42·8°C 1·35 [1·09–1·66]) and risk of death from malaria was heightened by precipitation at or above 45·3 cm (all ages: 45·3 cm 1·68 [1·31–2·14], 61·6 cm 1·72 [1·27–2·31], 87·7 cm 1·72 [1·16–2·55]; children younger than 5 years: 45·3 cm 1·81 [1·36–2·41], 61·6 cm 1·82 [1·29–2·56], 87·7 cm 1·93 [1·24–3·00]).Interpretation: Our results indicate a high burden of death related to extreme weather in the Sahel region of west Africa. This burden is likely to increase with climate change. Climate preparedness programmes—such as extreme weather alerts, passive cooling architecture, and rainwater drainage—should be tested and implemented to prevent deaths from climate-sensitive diseases in vulnerable communities in Burkina Faso and the wider Sahel region.
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| 2. |
- Baena-Morales, Salvador, et al.
(author)
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Towards a more sustainable future: simple and effective recommendations to integrate planetary health into education
- 2023
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In: The Lancet Planetary Health. - 2542-5196. ; 7:10
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Research review (peer-reviewed)abstract
- This Personal View presents recommendations aimed at integrating planetary health into various stages of education, which are simple but effective, and designed with teachers in training and those who have not yet considered how to incorporate UNESCO’s Education for Sustainable Development into their teaching practice. However, the constantly evolving nature of the Education for Sustainable Development programme must be recognised, and the importance of being able to adapt teaching methods to meet the changing needs of students as they progress through their educational journey should be highlighted. Therefore, this Personal View considers the cognitive, social, and ethical evolution of students and offers specific recommendations for preschool, primary, secondary, and university education levels. We recommend that educators should focus on teaching students to critically evaluate data on sustainability and to develop innovative solutions to environmental challenges. We also highlight the importance of incorporating practical projects, using active methods that promote skills related to caring for the planet, or the importance of situated learning that attends to the particularities of each context. In this way, students can develop skills and values that contribute to a more sustainable future. The recommendations made here aim to provide educators and researchers with simple but effective ways to integrate planetary health into education.
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| 3. |
- Galaz, Victor, et al.
(author)
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Financial influence on global risks of zoonotic emerging and re-emerging diseases : an integrative analysis
- 2023
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In: The Lancet Planetary Health. - 2542-5196. ; 7:12, s. e951-E962
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Background: Emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases (EIDs), such as Ebola virus disease and highly pathogenic influenza, are serious threats to human health and wellbeing worldwide. The financial sector has an important, yet often ignored, influence as owners and investors in industries that are associated with anthropogenic land-use changes in ecosystems linked to increased EIDs risks. We aimed to analyse financial influence associated with EIDs risks that are affected by anthropogenic land-use changes. We also aimed to provide empirical assessments of such influence to help guide engagements by governments, private organisations, and non-governmental organisations with the financial sector to advance a planetary health agenda.Methods: For this integrative analysis, we identified regions in the world where there was evidence of a connection between EIDs and anthropogenic land-use changes between Nov 9, 1999, and Oct 25, 2021, through a targeted literature review of academic literature and grey literature to identify evidence of drivers of anthropogenic land-use change and their association with commodity production in these regions. We only included publications in English that showed a connection between deforestation and the production of one or more commodities. Publications merely describing spatial or temporal land-use change dynamics (eg, a reduction of forest or an increase of palm-oil plantations) were excluded. As we were assessing financial influence on corporate activities through ownership specifically, we focused our analysis on publicly listed companies. Equity data and data about ownership structure were extracted from Orbis, a company information database. We assessed financial influence by identifying financial entities with the largest equity ownership, descriptively mapping transboundary connections between investors and publicly listed companies.Findings 227 public and private companies operating in five economic sectors (ie, production of palm oil, pulp and wood products, cocoa, soybeans, and beef) between Dec 15, 2020, and March 8, 2021, were identified. Of these 227, 99 (44%) were publicly listed companies, with 2310 unique shareholders. These publicly listed companies operated in six geographical regions, resulting in nine case-study regions. 54 (55%) companies with complete geographical information were included in the countries network. Four financial entities (ie, Dimensional, Vanguard, BlackRock, and Norway's sovereign wealth fund) each had ownership in 39 companies or more in three of the case-study regions (ie, north America, east Asia, and Europe). Four large US-based asset managers (ie, Vanguard, BlackRock, T Rowe Price, and State Street) were the largest owners of publicly listed companies in terms of total equity size, with ownership amounts for these four entities ranging from US$8 billion to $21 billion. The specific patterns of cross -national ownership depended on the region of interest; for example, financial influence on EIDs risks that was associated with commodity production in southeast and east Asia came from not only global asset managers but also Malaysian, Chinese, Japanese, and Korean financial entities. India, Brazil, the USA, Mexico, and Argentina were the countries towards which investments were most directed. Interpretation Although commodity supply chains and financial markets are highly globalised, a small number of investors and countries could be viewed as disproportionally influential in sectors that increase EIDs risks. Such financial influence could be used to develop and implement effective policies to reduce ecological degradation and mitigate EIDs risks and their effects on population health.
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| 8. |
- Shannon, Geordan, et al.
(author)
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Think global, act local : using a translocal approach to understand community-based organisations' responses to planetary health crises during COVID-19
- 2023
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In: The Lancet Planetary Health. - : Elsevier. - 2542-5196. ; 7:10, s. e850-e858
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Little is known on how community-based responses to planetary health crises, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, can integrate concerns about livelihoods, equity, health, wellbeing, and the environment. We used a translocal learning approach to co-develop insights on community-based responses to complex health and environmental and economic crises with leaders from five organisations working with communities at the front line of intersecting planetary health challenges in Finland, India, Kenya, Peru, and the USA. Translocal learning supports collective knowledge production across different localities in ways that value local perspectives but transcend national boundaries. There were three main findings from the translocal learning process. First, thanks to their proximity to the communities they served, community-based organisations (CBOs) can quickly identify the ways in which COVID-19 might worsen existing social and health inequities. Second, localised CBO actions are key to supporting communities with unique challenges in the face of systemic planetary health crises. Third, CBOs can develop rights-based, ecologically-minded actions responding to local priorities and mobilising available resources. Our findings show how solutions to planetary health might come from small-scale community initiatives that are well connected within and across contexts. Locally-focused globally-aware actions should be harnessed through greater recognition, funding, and networking opportunities. Globally, planetary health initiatives should be supported by applying the principles of subsidiarity and translocalism.
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| 9. |
- Wernli, Didier, et al.
(author)
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Scope and applicability of social-ecological resilience to antimicrobial resistance
- 2023
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In: The Lancet Planetary Health. - 2542-5196. ; 7:7, s. e630-E637
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Journal article (peer-reviewed)abstract
- Social-ecological systems conceptualise how social human systems and ecological natural systems are intertwined. In this Personal View, we define the scope and applicability of social-ecological resilience to antimicrobial resistance. Resilience to antimicrobial resistance corresponds to the capacity to maintain the societal benefits of antimicrobial use and One Health systems' performance in the face of the evolutionary behaviour of microorganisms in response to antimicrobial use. Social-ecological resilience provides an appropriate framework to make sense of the disruptive impacts resulting from the emergence and spread of antimicrobial resistance; capture the diversity of strategies needed to tackle antimicrobial resistance and to live with it; understand the conditions that underpin the success or failure of interventions; and appreciate the need for adaptive and coevolutionary governance. Overall, resilience thinking is essential to improve understanding of how human societies dynamically can cope with, adapt, and transform to the growing global challenge of antimicrobial resistance.
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