Public Health Corner: August 2024
Welcome to the Public Health Corner, a quarterly section in the Southwest Climate Outlook dedicated to exploring the intersection between climate change and public health in Arizona and New Mexico!
Extreme heat is a global health emergency. In last year’s Public Health Corner, we talked about the importance of taking proactive steps to protect ourselves and our communities against extreme heat. To better support Arizona through extreme heat, the Governor’s Office released an Executive Order on Extreme Heat Planning and Preparedness in August 2023. As part of that executive order, our partners at the Arizona Department of Health Services (ADHS), through the Building Resilience Against Climate Effects grant, held the Arizona Heat Planning Summit in October 2023 to help inform planning efforts. CLIMAS (Heidi Brown, Ladd Keith, Stacie Reece) supported the Southern Arizona Heat Summit held in February 2024 that supported state planning efforts and led to the City of Tucson’s newly adopted Heat Action Roadmap. The Governor’s office then released Arizona’s Extreme Heat Preparedness Plan in March 2024 which was co-authored by CLIMAS researcher Dr. Ladd Keith. As part of the plan, ADHS released their Recommendations and Findings for the Arizona Extreme Heat Preparedness Plan in March 2024. At the recent press conference for Arizona Heat Awareness Week (May 6-10, 2024) convened by Arizona Governor Katie Hobbs in collaboration with ADHS and many city, state, and community partners, CLIMAS researcher Dr. Heidi Brown represented the University of Arizona and spoke about the collaborative research programs currently led and coordinated by the UArizona to prepare and protect communities from extreme heat. New Mexico hosted its first virtual Extreme Heat Health & Resiliency Summit in July 2024, hosted by Healthy Climate New Mexico with support of CLIMAS team member Dr. Dave DuBois.
The Southwest Urban Corridor Integrated Field Laboratory (SW-IFL) Intensive Observation Period (IOP) Campaign was conducted this summer and included multiple data collection activities throughout the Arizona urban corridor to improve our understanding of extreme heat and associated environmental and societal stressors. Brookhaven National Lab's mobile observatories collected atmospheric research data from land and building surfaces to answer questions related to extreme heat and air quality. The mobile observatories travelled through the Phoenix metro valley from June 3-26 and the Tucson area from June 28 - July 2.
Want to see the latest trends for heat-related illnesses (HRI) in your state? You can now see near real-time emergency department visits for HRI in Arizona and New Mexico through each states’ Environmental Public Health Tracking dashboards.
Join us next quarter in the Public Health Corner as we explore the health impacts of climate change in Arizona and New Mexico, and discover ways we can all work together to create a healthier and more resilient future.