Assessing Potential Impacts of Sea Level Rise on Public Health and Vulnerable Populations in Southeast Florida and Providing a Framework to Improve Outcomes

Abstract

Abstract:In recent years, ongoing efforts by a multitude of universities, local governments, federal agencies, and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have been focused on sea-level rise (SLR) adaptation in Florida. However, within these efforts, there has been very little attention given to the potential impacts of sea-level rise on human health. The intent of this project is to identify populations in Southeast Florida that are most vulnerable to sea-level rise from a topographic perspective, determine how vulnerable these population are from a socio-economic perspective, identify potential health impacts, develop adaptation strategies designed to assist these communities, and produce an outreach effort that can be shared with other coastal communities. The location of socially-vulnerable and health-vulnerable populations are correlated, but at present they are not generally in the geographically-vulnerable areas. Projections indicate that they will become at risk in the future but the lack of data on emerging diseases makes public health assessments difficult. We propose a redefinition of "who is vulnerable?" to include health indicators and hard infrastructure solutions for flood and property protection. These tools can be used to help protect water resources from the impacts of climate change, which would, in turn, protect public health via drinking water supplies, and efforts to address social issues.

Climate Change–Related Water Disasters’ Impact on Population Health

“…Susceptibility of individuals, communities, and countries was described in many of the articles. Risk factors that increase susceptibility to greater impact from CCRWDs include living in poverty, living in unstable dwellings, and lacking access to health care (Alderman et al, 2012;Bloetscher et al, 2016;Burton et al, 2016;Dressler, Allison, Broach, Smith, & Milsten, 2016;Grabich, Horney, Konrad, & Lobdell, 2016;Khan, Gruebner, & Kraemer, 2014;Lane et al, 2013;Rodriguez-Llanes, Ranjan-Dash, Mukhopadhyay, & Guha-Sapir, 2016;Schmeltz et al, 2013;Srikuta, Inmuong, Inmuong, & Bradshaw, 2015). There is a strong correlation between social and health vulnerability as measured by lack of income, percentage of minority residents, lower educational attainment, lack of English fluency, low take up of medical services, age, and disability status (Bloetscher et al, 2016).…”

“…Males are more susceptible to drowning (the largest cause of mortality from cyclones), and males are most susceptible to dying from cyclones (Doocy, Dick, Daniels, & Kirsch, 2013). Other factors that were associated with susceptibility include being female, being very young or elderly, living with a disability, being an ethnic minorities, lacking fluency in the country's primary language, having a female head of household, and having lower educational attainment (Abbas & Routray, 2014;Alderman et al, 2012;Bloetscher et al, 2016;Burton et al, 2016;Grabich et al, 2016;Khan et al, 2014;Lane et al, 2013;Rodriguez-Llanes et al, 2016;Schmeltz et al, 2013;Srikuta et al, 2015). Children are more susceptible to injuries, diarrheal diseases, and respiratory infections (Phung et al, 2014).…”

Sustainability for Shrinking Cities

“…Gulachenski et al [47] discusses the urban greening that is happening as a consequence of "counter-urbanization" in shrinking cities; this trend has great potential for generating ecosystem disservices, particularly public health risks as a result of greater exposure to vector-and water-borne pathogens. Bloetscher et al [48] show how sea level rise has many of the same outcomes shrinking cities experience through population loss, such as compromised infrastructure and new public health risks experienced by vulnerable populations.…”

Adaptation of Florida’s Urban Infrastructure to Climate Change

“…This means that effective methods for protecting the coastal infrastructure must be found. And finally, there are indications that the frequency of certain vector and waterborne illnesses due to climate changes (Bloetscher et al 2016). Therefore, a better understanding of future trends in mosquito-spread diseases (e.g., Zika, dengue fever, or chikungunya) or waterborne diseases (e.g., giardia and cryptosporidium) is needed to adequately address the challenges posed by climate change.…”

“…Floridians should anticipate sea level rise that will threaten infrastructure reliability, economic activity, property values, public health and put population risks (Bloetscher et al 2012(Bloetscher et al , 2014(Bloetscher et al , 2016, all of which will be tied to Florida's changing climate.…”