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Concerns over calculating injury-related deaths associated with temperature

Nature Medicine volume 26, pages 1825–1826 (2020)Cite this article

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Matters Arising to this article was published on 16 November 2020

The Original Article was published on 13 January 2020

arising from R. M. Parks et al. Nature Medicine https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-019-0721-y (2020)

Parks et al.1 reported projections of an additional 1,601 temperature-related deaths associated with injuries in the United States under the Paris Agreement climate goals. However, we believe that these analyses misinterpret the Paris Agreement and that there are potential flaws in the epidemiological modeling that limit the validity of the findings.

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Fig. 1: An example of monthly averaged temperature anomalies over the contiguous United States between 1980–2015 and a 1.5 °C warmer world.

Data availability

The data in this study are freely available through the HAPPI consortium (www.happimip.org), or through contacting the corresponding author directly.

References

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cabot Institute for the Environment, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK

    Dann Mitchell & Y. T. Eunice Lo

  2. Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Myles Allen

  3. Centre for Health and the Global Environment, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, USA

    Kristie L. Ebi

  4. Faculty of Public Health and Policy, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, London, UK

    Antonio Gasparrini & Clare Heaviside

  5. Institute for Environmental Design and Engineering, UCL, London, UK

    Clare Heaviside

  6. Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland

    Ana M. Vicedo-Cabrera

  7. Oeschger Center for Climate Change Research, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland

    Ana M. Vicedo-Cabrera

Authors
  1. Dann Mitchell
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  2. Myles Allen
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  3. Kristie L. Ebi
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  4. Antonio Gasparrini
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  5. Clare Heaviside
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  6. Y. T. Eunice Lo
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  7. Ana M. Vicedo-Cabrera
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Contributions

All authors designed the paper by discussing the key concerns to be included. D.M. wrote the initial draft. M.A., K.L.E., A.G., C.H. and A.M.V.-C. adapted the draft. Y.T.E.L. prepared the figure. All authors approved the final draft.

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Correspondence to Dann Mitchell.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Mitchell, D., Allen, M., Ebi, K.L. et al. Concerns over calculating injury-related deaths associated with temperature. Nat Med 26, 1825–1826 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-020-1113-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-020-1113-z

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