Climate change and public health in California: A structured review of exposures, vulnerable populations, and adaptation measures.

California faces several serious direct and indirect climate exposures that can adversely affect public health, some of which are already occurring. The public health burden now and in the future will depend on atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, underlying population vulnerabilities, and adaptation efforts. Here, we present a structured review of recent literature to examine the leading climate risks to public health in California, including extreme heat, extreme precipitation, wildfires, air pollution, and infectious diseases.

Air Pollution and Blood Pressure: Evidence From Indonesia.

Indonesia faces significant air quality issues due to multiple emissions sources, including rapid urbanization and peatland fires associated with agricultural land management. Limited prior research has estimated the episodic shock of intense fires on morbidity and mortality in Indonesia but has largely ignored the impact of poor air quality throughout the year on biomarkers of cardiovascular disease risk. We conducted a cross-sectional study of the association between particulate matter less than 2.

Mortality attributable to PM from wildland fires in California from 2008 to 2018.

In California, wildfire risk and severity have grown substantially in the last several decades. Research has characterized extensive adverse health impacts from exposure to wildfire-attributable fine particulate matter (PM), but few studies have quantified long-term outcomes, and none have used a wildfire-specific chronic dose-response mortality coefficient. Here, we quantified the mortality burden for PM exposure from California fires from 2008 to 2018 using Community Multiscale Air Quality modeling system wildland fire PM estimates.

Exploring spatial heterogeneity in synergistic effects of compound climate hazards: Extreme heat and wildfire smoke on cardiorespiratory hospitalizations in California.

Extreme heat and wildfire smoke events are increasingly co-occurring in the context of climate change, especially in California. Extreme heat and wildfire smoke may have synergistic effects on population health that vary over space. We leveraged high-resolution satellite and monitoring data to quantify spatially varying compound exposures to extreme heat and wildfire smoke in California (2006-2019) at ZIP Code Tabulation Area (ZCTA) level.

Advancing the community health vulnerability index for wildland fire smoke exposure.

Wildland fire smoke risks are not uniformly distributed across people and places, and the most vulnerable communities are often disproportionately impacted. This study develops a county level community health vulnerability index (CHVI) for the Contiguous United States (CONUS) using three major vulnerability components: adaptive capacity, sensitivity, and exposure at the national and regional level. We first calculated sensitivity and adaptive capacity sub-indices using nine sensitivity and twenty adaptive capacity variables.

Short-Term total and wildfire fine particulate matter exposure and work loss in California.

Background: Few studies investigated the impact of particulate matter (PM) on some symptom exacerbations that are not perceived as severe enough to search for medical assistance. We aimed to study the association of short-term daily total PM exposure with work loss due to sickness among adults living in California.

Methods: We included 44,544 adult respondents in the workforce from 2015 to 2018 California Health Interview Survey data.

Up in smoke: California's greenhouse gas reductions could be wiped out by 2020 wildfires.

In this short communication, we estimate that California's wildfire carbon dioxide equivalent (COe) emissions from 2020 are approximately two times higher than California's total greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reductions since 2003. Without considering future vegetation regrowth, COe emissions from the 2020 wildfires could be the second most important source in the state above either industry or electrical power generation. Regrowth may partly of fully occur over a long period, but due to exigencies of the climate crisis most of the regrowth will not occur quickly enough to avert greater than 1.

Impacts of Fine Particulate Matter From Wildfire Smoke on Respiratory and Cardiovascular Health in California.

Increases in wildfire activity across the Western US pose a significant public health threat. While there is evidence that wildfire smoke is detrimental for respiratory health, the impacts on cardiovascular health remain unclear. This study evaluates the association between fine particulate matter (PM) from wildfire smoke and unscheduled cardiorespiratory hospital visits in California during the 2004-2009 wildfire seasons.

Wildfire, Smoke Exposure, Human Health, and Environmental Justice Need to be Integrated into Forest Restoration and Management.

Purpose Of Review: Increasing wildfire size and severity across the western United States has created an environmental and social crisis that must be approached from a transdisciplinary perspective. Climate change and more than a century of fire exclusion and wildfire suppression have led to contemporary wildfires with more severe environmental impacts and human smoke exposure. Wildfires increase smoke exposure for broad swaths of the US population, though outdoor workers and socially disadvantaged groups with limited adaptive capacity can be disproportionally exposed.

Fires, Smoke Exposure, and Public Health: An Integrative Framework to Maximize Health Benefits From Peatland Restoration.

Emissions of particulate matter from fires associated with land management practices in Indonesia contribute to regional air pollution and mortality. We assess the public health benefits in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore from policies to reduce fires by integrating information on fire emissions, atmospheric transport patterns, and population exposure to fine particulate matter (PM). We use adjoint sensitivities to relate fire emissions to PM for a range of meteorological conditions and find that a Business-As-Usual scenario of land use change leads, on average, to 36,000 excess deaths per year into the foreseeable future (the next several decades) across the region.

Major atmospheric emissions from peat fires in Southeast Asia during non-drought years: evidence from the 2013 Sumatran fires.

Trans-boundary haze events in Southeast Asia are associated with large forest and peatland fires in Indonesia. These episodes of extreme air pollution usually occur during drought years induced by climate anomalies from the Pacific (El Niño Southern Oscillation) and Indian Oceans (Indian Ocean Dipole). However, in June 2013--a non-drought year--Singapore's 24-hr Pollutants Standards Index reached an all-time record 246 (rated "very unhealthy").

Future fire emissions associated with projected land use change in Sumatra.

Indonesia has experienced rapid land use change over the last few decades as forests and peatswamps have been cleared for more intensively managed land uses, including oil palm and timber plantations. Fires are the predominant method of clearing and managing land for more intensive uses, and the related emissions affect public health by contributing to regional particulate matter and ozone concentrations and adding to global atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations. Here, we examine emissions from fires associated with land use clearing and land management on the Indonesian island of Sumatra and the sensitivity of this fire activity to interannual meteorological variability.

El Niño and health risks from landscape fire emissions in Southeast Asia.

Emissions from landscape fires affect both climate and air quality. In this study, we combine satellite-derived fire estimates and atmospheric modeling to quantify health effects from fire emissions in Southeast Asia from 1997 to 2006. This region has large interannual variability in fire activity due to coupling between El Niño-induced droughts and anthropogenic land use change.

Estimated global mortality attributable to smoke from landscape fires.

Background: Forest, grass, and peat fires release approximately 2 petagrams of carbon into the atmosphere each year, influencing weather, climate, and air quality.

Objective: We estimated the annual global mortality attributable to landscape fire smoke (LFS).

Methods: Daily and annual exposure to particulate matter ≤ 2.

Forecasting fire season severity in South America using sea surface temperature anomalies.

Fires in South America cause forest degradation and contribute to carbon emissions associated with land use change. We investigated the relationship between year-to-year changes in fire activity in South America and sea surface temperatures. We found that the Oceanic Niño Index was correlated with interannual fire activity in the eastern Amazon, whereas the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation index was more closely linked with fires in the southern and southwestern Amazon.