PN003 - Medications, Weather, and Health Outcomes

Climate change is one of the defining challenges of our time. Eight of the ten hottest years on record occurred in the past decade. Such change has profound detrimental health consequences throughout the lifespan, including both direct effects such as heatwaves, floods, or wildfires, and indirect effects, such as lack of food security, increased air pollution, and greater vulnerability to mosquito-borne diseases. Extreme temperatures and weather events also interact with medication use. Heatwaves, ambient air pollution, and other extreme weather events can act synergistically to increase adverse effects of commonly used medications through a variety of pathways. However, the interplay of medication use and climate-related extreme weather events is only beginning to be systematically examined.

Learning objectives:
-To appreciate the effects of climate change on human health.
-To recognize the mechanisms by which outcomes of commonly used medications can be affected by extreme weather events.
-To understand methodological approaches to the study of drug-climate interactions.