The relationship between heat and the prevalence of stillbirth in India

• In Event: Sociology of Population Section Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 2. Reproductive Health

Abstract

Maternal and newborn health outcomes are understudied areas of climate change research, and pregnancy is only recently coming to be understood as an important vulnerability in the face of environmental hazards such as heat stress. Thus the impact of heat stress on adverse pregnancy outcomes has remained poorly understood. Stillbirth, or late gestation pregnancy loss, are particularly challenging to study because they are known to be difficult to measure, especially in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where most of the world’s stillbirths occur. In this study, we link two rounds of Demographic and Health Survey data on the prevalence of stillbirth with location-specific temperatures in India, the country with the greatest number of stillbirths annually. Using both analysis of seasonality of stillbirth and regression analyses, we find greater likelihood of stillbirth at both colder and hotter temperatures. We also find suggestive evidence of disparities in the probability of stillbirth among those in the poorest wealth quintile compared to those in the wealthiest quintile across temperatures. While it is commonly believed that stillbirths are unpreventable and occur randomly, stillbirth’s sensitivity to climactic exposures demonstrates its preventability. Measuring and documenting the adverse impacts of rising heat on women and babies in LMICs is essential to capture the full cost of climate change.

Authors

• Payal Hathi, University of Colorado Boulder

• Nisha Koppa