9 December 2024: The 麻豆村 of Canberra’s (UC) Global Research Centre for Healthy Environments and Lives (HEAL) has received a $5 million funding boost from to develop climate and health impact assessment tools through the new project, Climate Attribution of Wildfire Smoke Impacts on Priority Population Health in Southeast Asia and Australia (CANBREATHE).
The new project will effectively engage, educate and empower priority groups, such as Indigenous peoples, pregnant women and children in Southeast Asia and Australia on the health impacts of bushfires and associated smoke haze in a changing global environment.
In a warming climate, the frequency, intensity and duration of extreme wildfires and smoke haze pollution in Southeast Asia and Australia are increasing – and subsequently, cardiovascular and respiratory illnesses such as asthma in sensitive populations could worsen over the years. Professor Sotiris Vardoulakis, Director of the HEAL Global Research Centre argues that vulnerable populations may be missing out on these vitally important health messages. The CANBREATHE project aims to bridge these communication gaps.
“The CANBREATHE project will combine climate modelling, health data and lived experience to communicate the long-term effects of bushfires and smoke haze pollution exposure. People are starting to understand the health impacts posed by wildfire smoke, however, they do not clearly link it to climate or environmental change,” he said.
“With Indigenous people, pregnant women and children being disproportionally affected by climate change in Australia and Asia, it is important to develop data-driven communication tools that are both accessible, and easy to understand, by priority populations. The knowledge generated and then translated into practical solutions will not only improve our health today but for future generations to come.”
Funded by Wellcome over three years commencing in 2025, researchers from the Australian HEAL Network and Southeast Asia will focus on populations in four countries – Australia, Thailand, Laos and Indonesia – due to their lived experiences of suffering extreme or recurrent wildfires.
Distinguished Professor Kim Oanh from the Asia Institute of Technology in Thailand said, “air pollution from forest and agricultural fires is a major public health concern in Southeast Asia.”
“These seasonal fires cause deforestation and smoke haze across the region, disproportionally impacting poorer people, especially children. Climate change increases the risk of fires making things worse.”
Associate Professor Veronica Matthews, the HEAL Network’s Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lead sees the project as an exciting opportunity to build on the HEAL Network’s momentum of linking climate, environmental and health data with cultural knowledge.
“This project will engage Indigenous peoples and communities, citizen scientists, policymakers and artists to co-design communication tools to educate and empower those communities who are already feeling the impact of climate change,” said Matthews.
Currently funded through the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) Special Initiative in Human Health and Environmental Change, the HEAL Network brings together Indigenous knowledge, sustainable development, environmental epidemiology, and data science and communication to address climate change and its impacts on health.
For more information on the HEAL Network visit - .