The HEAT-SHIELD project - Perspectives from an inter-sectoral approach to occupational heat stress

Research output: Contribution to journalReviewpeer-review

Documents

  • Nathan Bradley Morris
  • Piil, Jacob Feder
  • Marco Morabito
  • Alessandro Messeri
  • Miriam Levi
  • Leonidas Ioannou
  • Ursa Ciuha
  • Tjaša Pogačar
  • Lučka Kajfež Bogataj
  • Boris Kingma
  • Ana Casanueva
  • Sven Kotlarski
  • Christoph Spirig
  • Josh Foster
  • George Havenith
  • Tiago Sotto Mayor
  • Andreas D Flouris
  • Nybo, Lars

Objectives: To provide perspectives from the HEAT-SHIELD project (www.heat-shield.eu): a multi-national, inter-sectoral, and cross-disciplinary initiative, incorporating twenty European research institutions, as well as occupational health and industrial partners, on solutions to combat negative health and productivity effects caused by working on a warmer world.

Methods: In this invited review, we focus on the theoretical and methodological advancements developed to combat occupational heat stress during the last five years of operation.

Results: We outline how we created climate forecast models to incorporate humidity, wind and solar radiation to the traditional temperature-based climate projections, providing the basis for timely, policy-relevant, industry-specific and individualized information. Further, we summarise the industry-specific guidelines we developed regarding technical and biophysical cooling solutions considering effectiveness, cost, sustainability, and the practical implementation potential in outdoor and indoor settings, in addition to field-testing of selected solutions with time-motion analyses and biophysical evaluations. All recommendations were adjusted following feedback from workshops with employers, employees, safety officers, and adjacent stakeholders such as local or national health policy makers. The cross-scientific approach was also used for providing policy-relevant information based on socioeconomic analyses and identification of vulnerable regions considered to be more relevant for political actions than average continental recommendations and interventions.

Discussion: From the HEAT-SHIELD experiences developed within European settings, we discuss how this inter-sectoral approach may be adopted or translated into actionable knowledge across continents where workers and societies are affected by escalating environmental temperatures.

Original languageEnglish
JournalJournal of Science and Medicine in Sport
Volume24
Issue number8
Pages (from-to)747-755
Number of pages9
ISSN1440-2440
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 2021

Bibliographical note

Copyright © 2021 Sports Medicine Australia. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

    Research areas

  • Faculty of Science - Occupational medicine, Occupational hygiene, Occupational physiology, Environmental physiologyy, Public health, Occupational health

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