A research centre at the National University of Singapore working on building heat resilience will be tasked with leading South-east Asia’s efforts in combating rising temperatures.
The Heat Resilience and Performance Centre at the NUS Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine will be the South-east Asian node for the Global Heat Health Information Network, an information-sharing initiative by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO).
The announcement was made on the sidelines of the United Nations’ COP28 climate conference, which is being held in Dubai from Nov 30 to Dec 12.
For the first time, health issues have been elevated on the climate agenda, to raise awareness of how climate change affects human health, causing heat stress, polluting air, and creating conditions for more vector-borne diseases.
For example, air pollution – caused mainly by the burning of fossil fuels – is responsible for more than 6.5 million deaths a year globally, a figure that is on the rise, according to a study published in 2022 in the Lancet Planetary Health journal.
The new appointment opens doors for the NUS centre to work closely with international and regional partners, said its director, Associate Professor Jason Lee.
The goal is to create and scale up efforts to protect populations from the adverse health impact of extreme ambient heat in the South-east Asian region.
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