Ambient Temperature During Gestation and Cold-Related Adult Mortality in a Swedish Cohort, 1915 to 2002

Arbeitspapier

For all climatic regions, mortality due to cold exceeds mortality due to heat. We examine whether cold-related mortality in adulthood varies positively with unusually benign ambient temperature during gestation, using data on over 13,500 Swedes from the Uppsala Birth Cohort Study born in 1915-1929 and followed until 2003. We link daily thermometer temperatures in Uppsala (1914 to 2002) to subjects, from their estimated date of conception onwards. We estimate survival models with time-varying explanatory variables, focusing on the two leading causes of cold-related death in adulthood: ischaemic heart disease (IHD) and stroke. An increase in the prevalence of warm temperatures during gestation leads to a significantly higher rate of mortality due to cold-related IHD. However, we do not find such a relation for cold-related stroke mortality. Additional analyses show that birthweight percentile or gestational age do not mediate discovered findings. The IHD results indicate that ambient temperature during gestation – independent of birth month – modifies the relation between cold and adult mortality.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: IZA Discussion Papers ; No. 7986

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; Health Behavior ; Climate; Natural Disasters and Their Management; Global Warming
• Subject: temperature regulation ; climate ; cerebrovascular disorders ; cold spells ; fetal development ; health ; ischaemic heart disease ; migration

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Bruckner, Tim A. ; van den Berg, Gerard J. ; Smith, Kirk R. ; Catalano, Ralph A.
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)
• (where): Bonn
• (when): 2014

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/93296
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:43 AM CET