Tuesday, 14 January 2020: 3:00 PM
Given the increasing frequency, duration and intensity of heat waves, applying effective strategies for preventing adverse health effects related to heat exposure is an urgent imperative. This presentation will cover multiple such strategies and discuss how research being conducted in Detroit, Michigan by a community-academic partnership is providing new insights about how individuals from low to moderate income single-family and public housing households perceive the risk from heat waves, access energy and social services to enhance resilience, including heat wave warning program services, and react to potential scenarios related to power outages during heat waves.
Strategies to prevent heat-related illness and death include both longer-term efforts to enhance community resilience and shorter-term efforts to warn people of expected hot weather and take specific steps to offer health-protective measures, including opening cooling centers and outreach to vulnerable populations, such as elderly and the homeless.
Among the longer-term community-resilience strategies we have been researching and discussing with residents and representatives of three neighborhoods in Detroit are: enhancing energy efficiency of homes; connecting residents with assistance programs; exploring renewable options, including solar; and increasing community efficacy to address hot weather through group meetings and case management assistance. We will present results from surveys conducted in July 2019 among 40 residents of these neighborhoods on their 'baseline' knowledge and access to residential energy efficiency programs, and update AMS participants on two subsequent interactions with these 40 residents at both a group workshop and individual home visit.
Because epidemiologic and qualitative studies have shown that certain populations, including lower income, urban and minority populations, are more vulnerable to heat, the research we are conducting in cooperation with Detroit residents holds promise for better understanding of prevention strategies. In the long run, we hope the case management model we are developing and testing may be adopted in other urban settings.
This work was supported by NSF grant 1520803 and the University of Michigan Poverty Solutions initiative.
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