Global health leader to outline ways to protect children from health impacts of climate change
A leading figure in global child health, Zulfiqar Bhutta will deliver the next Maury Strauss Distinguished Public Lecture on April 4 at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC.
Flooding, deforestation, water insecurity, extreme weather events, sweltering heat, and poor air quality are just some climate effects on human health – and they’re increasing in frequency and magnitude, according to the 2023 Provisional State of the Global Climate Report.
“The worrying thing is that it’s on a time scale which is faster than people projected and imagined,” Zulfiqar Bhutta said in an interview with Climate Reality. He is the Robert Harding Inaugural Chair in Global Child Health at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto, where he co-directs the Center for Global Child Health.
While Americans have felt the impact of climate change, Bhutta believes climate disruption disproportionately threatens vulnerable populations, particularly children in low- and middle-income countries.
Bhutta will explore this urgent health issue in the next Maury Strauss Distinguished Public Lecture titled "The Impact of Climate Change on Vulnerable Populations: What Can Be Done?" at 5:30 p.m. Thursday, April 4, at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC in Roanoke.
“Children bear a disproportionate burden of the health impacts of climate change, first because of exposure and risks and secondarily because of greater physiological vulnerability,” Bhutta said.
Bhutta is a professor in the Department of Pediatrics at the University of Toronto and serves as the Distinguished National Professor of the Government of Pakistan. He also serves as the founding director of the Institute for Global Health and Development and the Center of Excellence in Women and Child Health at the Aga Khan University.
"The insights Dr. Bhutta brings are important for developing planning to be able to most effectively respond to the health challenges of climate change, particularly for children," said Michael Friedlander, Virginia Tech’s vice president for health sciences and technology and executive director of the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute. “We are excited to bring to our community one of the world’s leading research voices in the health sciences realm to share with us the latest data and approaches to mitigating the health consequences of this challenge, particularly on the most vulnerable populations.”
Bhutta is part of a United Nations-appointed independent expert review group designed to monitor global maternal and child health. He also co-chairs the World Health Organization’s maternal and child health oversight committee. He is an elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Medicine, an elected Fellow of the Royal Society of the United Kingdom and the recipient of multiple global health awards including the Roux Prize for global contributions to maternal and child health, the John Dirks Gardner Foundation Global Health Award and the Henry Friesen Prize for International Health Research.
His research spans newborn and child survival, maternal and child undernutrition, and micronutrient deficiencies. In the past year alone, Bhutta has published more than 50 studies in such diverse areas as global trends in obesity and underweight populations, the impact of health care worker coverage on maternal and child health, immunization in conflict zones, maternal COVID-19 vaccination outcomes, and noncommunicable diseases and risk factors among youth and adolescents.
Raised in Pakistan, Bhutta completed his medical degree at the University of Peshawar and his doctoral degree at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden. He is a fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Royal College of Physicians, the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health, and the Pakistan Academy of Sciences. Bhutta also holds adjunct professorships at numerous universities worldwide, including Johns Hopkins University, Tufts University, University of Alberta, and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.
The lecture is part of the institute's public lecture series, supported by Roanoke businessman and philanthropist Maury Strauss, to engage the community with groundbreaking research addressing some of the most pressing global health challenges.
The community is invited to attend the lecture, which includes a pre-lecture reception with refreshments at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at 2 Riverside Circle in Roanoke. The event will also be livestreamed via Zoom and archived on the institute's website.
