Impact of population aging on future temperature-related mortality at different global warming levels.

Chen, Kai; De Schrijver, Evan; Sivaraj, Sidharth; Sera, Francesco; Scovronick, Noah; Jiang, Leiwen; Roye, Dominic; Lavigne, Eric; Kyselý, Jan; Urban, Aleš; Schneider, Alexandra; Huber, Veronika; Madureira, Joana; Mistry, Malcolm N; Cvijanovic, Ivana; Gasparrini, Antonio; Vicedo-Cabrera, Ana M (2024). Impact of population aging on future temperature-related mortality at different global warming levels. Nature communications, 15, p. 1796. Nature Publishing Group 10.1038/s41467-024-45901-z

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Older adults are generally amongst the most vulnerable to heat and cold. While temperature-related health impacts are projected to increase with global warming, the influence of population aging on these trends remains unclear. Here we show that at 1.5 °C, 2 °C, and 3 °C of global warming, heat-related mortality in 800 locations across 50 countries/areas will increase by 0.5%, 1.0%, and 2.5%, respectively; among which 1 in 5 to 1 in 4 heat-related deaths can be attributed to population aging. Despite a projected decrease in cold-related mortality due to progressive warming alone, population aging will mostly counteract this trend, leading to a net increase in cold-related mortality by 0.1%-0.4% at 1.5-3 °C global warming. Our findings indicate that population aging constitutes a crucial driver for future heat- and cold-related deaths, with increasing mortality burden for both heat and cold due to the aging population.

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