Heat-health in Italy - Local adaptation in social and health care
Greselin, Alessia (2022)
Greselin, Alessia
2022
Master's Programme in Global Society
Yhteiskuntatieteiden tiedekunta - Faculty of Social Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2022-05-17
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202204273887
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:tuni-202204273887
Tiivistelmä
Climate change undoubtedly represents one, if not the biggest, challenge of the 21st century. While mitigation strategies aim at reducing the impact of anthropogenic pressure on the environment, climate change-related hazards already threaten the livelihood of societies. Different phenomena are projected to intensify due to climate change, and heatwaves among others. Adaptation at different levels as well as across policy fields is therefore needed. With social and health care being directly responsible for the health and well-being of the population in a welfare state, adaptation in those policy fields is fundamental and worth further research.
Italy represents a valuable case study to investigate social and health care adaptation for different reasons. On the one hand, it is the country with the highest heat mortality worldwide. On the other hand, as in other European countries, there is an increasingly elderly population. As social and health care in Italy are both highly decentralized and different in development and organization, a sub-national perspective can provide valuable insights on heat adaptation across the country. After the European heatwave of 2003, several countries have adopted a heat plan. In Italy, in addition to the national heat plan, regions and cities have also equipped themselves with regional and local heat plans. However, due to the sub-national differences, adaptation could be interpreted and realized differently within the country. Therefore, in this thesis, I investigated the following research question: How have cities and regions interpreted and realised adaptation to heat-related threats to public health?
To answer the research question, I conducted a qualitative sub-national comparative study with regional and local heat plans as data. First, I selected the cities and regions to study both based on sub-national differences in social and health care as well as data availability. Second, I analysed the heat plans through thematic analysis and outlined three major themes. The findings show that heat adaptation in the plans 1) has involved intersectoral cooperation between social and health care, 2) has defined theoretically vulnerable people groups but only one is the service recipient, and 3) has included both home care and transfers to emergency location as main measures for care during a heatwave. Those findings are relevant both in the heat as well as social and health care research context. For heat adaptation research, the findings highlight the cooperation across policy fields, different layers of adaptation and how vulnerability factors can overlap. In the context of social and health care research, features of the Italian welfare regime(s) emerged in the fragmented and weak institutional social care system relying primarily on domestic and/or informal care. How adaptation is realised and how it differs at a sub-national level has implications on the well-being and health of the population. Regional and local differences have been detected, with some adaptation plans being far more comprehensive than others. Such differences could be related both to the impact of heat stress on the areas and on the features of the sub-national social and health care regimes.
As the ongoing climate crisis requires cooperation among different actors and policy fields, further research on adaptation from social policy scholars is needed. Additionally, sub-national differences highlight the need for policymakers to strengthen social and health care integration and to even differences across the country.
Italy represents a valuable case study to investigate social and health care adaptation for different reasons. On the one hand, it is the country with the highest heat mortality worldwide. On the other hand, as in other European countries, there is an increasingly elderly population. As social and health care in Italy are both highly decentralized and different in development and organization, a sub-national perspective can provide valuable insights on heat adaptation across the country. After the European heatwave of 2003, several countries have adopted a heat plan. In Italy, in addition to the national heat plan, regions and cities have also equipped themselves with regional and local heat plans. However, due to the sub-national differences, adaptation could be interpreted and realized differently within the country. Therefore, in this thesis, I investigated the following research question: How have cities and regions interpreted and realised adaptation to heat-related threats to public health?
To answer the research question, I conducted a qualitative sub-national comparative study with regional and local heat plans as data. First, I selected the cities and regions to study both based on sub-national differences in social and health care as well as data availability. Second, I analysed the heat plans through thematic analysis and outlined three major themes. The findings show that heat adaptation in the plans 1) has involved intersectoral cooperation between social and health care, 2) has defined theoretically vulnerable people groups but only one is the service recipient, and 3) has included both home care and transfers to emergency location as main measures for care during a heatwave. Those findings are relevant both in the heat as well as social and health care research context. For heat adaptation research, the findings highlight the cooperation across policy fields, different layers of adaptation and how vulnerability factors can overlap. In the context of social and health care research, features of the Italian welfare regime(s) emerged in the fragmented and weak institutional social care system relying primarily on domestic and/or informal care. How adaptation is realised and how it differs at a sub-national level has implications on the well-being and health of the population. Regional and local differences have been detected, with some adaptation plans being far more comprehensive than others. Such differences could be related both to the impact of heat stress on the areas and on the features of the sub-national social and health care regimes.
As the ongoing climate crisis requires cooperation among different actors and policy fields, further research on adaptation from social policy scholars is needed. Additionally, sub-national differences highlight the need for policymakers to strengthen social and health care integration and to even differences across the country.