Ambient temperature and stillbirth risks in northern Sweden, 1880–1950

Background: Climate vulnerability of the unborn can contribute to adverse birth outcomes, in particular, but it is still not well under-stood. We investigated the association between ambient temperature and stillbirth risk among a historical population in northern Sweden (1880–1950). Methods: We use...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Environmental Epidemiology
Main Authors: Karlsson, Lena, Junkka, Johan, Häggström Lundevaller, Erling, Schumann, Barbara
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Umeå universitet, Enheten för demografi och åldrandeforskning (CEDAR) 2021
Subjects:
Stillbirth
Ambient temperature
Seasonality
Environment
Climate vulnerability
Sweden
Public Health
Global Health
Social Medicine and Epidemiology
Folkhälsovetenskap
global hälsa
socialmedicin och epidemiologi
Obstetrics
Gynecology and Reproductive Medicine
Reproduktionsmedicin och gynekologi
Social and Economic Geography
Social och ekonomisk geografi
Northern Sweden
Subarctic
Online Access:http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-189202
https://doi.org/10.1097/EE9.0000000000000176
Description
Summary:Background: Climate vulnerability of the unborn can contribute to adverse birth outcomes, in particular, but it is still not well under-stood. We investigated the association between ambient temperature and stillbirth risk among a historical population in northern Sweden (1880–1950). Methods: We used digitized parish records and daily temperature data from the study region covering coastal and inland communi-ties some 600 km north of Stockholm, Sweden. The data included 141,880 births, and 3,217 stillbirths, corresponding to a stillbirth rate of 22.7 (1880–1950). The association between lagged temperature (0–7 days before birth) and stillbirths was estimated using a time-stratified case-crossover design. Incidence risk ratios (IRR) with 95% confidence intervals were computed, and stratified by season and sex. Results: We observed that the stillbirth risk increased both at low and high temperatures during the extended summer season (April to September), at −10°C, and the IRR was 2.3 (CI 1.28, 4.00) compared to the minimum mortality temperature of +15°C. No clear effect of temperature during the extended winter season (October to March) was found. Climate vulnerability was greater among the male fetus compared to the female counterparts. Conclusion: In this subarctic setting before and during industrialization, both heat and cold during the warmer season increased the stillbirth risk. Urbanization and socio-economic development might have contributed to an uneven decline in climate vulnerability of the unborn.

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