The National Institute of Aging has awarded an R01 grant for $3.2 million to a team of researchers to study the impact of climate change on life expectancy in a multi-ethnic population. According to the World Health Organization, between 2030 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause approximately 250,000 additional deaths per year, from malnutrition, malaria, diarrhea, and heat stress.
Professor of environmental and occupational health, Jun Wu, PhD, is a multi-principal investigator (MPI) of the study and is joined by Iona Cheng of UCSF (contact PI) and Anna Wu of USC (MPI).
The study will investigate the impacts of extreme heat and wildfire smoke on adult life expectancy by leveraging the unique epidemiological resources of the Multiethnic Cohort Study. This study was a large longitudinal study that includes 112,000 adult men and women from Calif., ages 45-75 at enrollment in 1993-1996, with a strong representation of diverse racial/ethnic and socioeconomic groups. The findings will expand our understanding of the contribution of long-term extreme heat and wildfire smoke on life expectancy.
