Business Courier: UC College of Medicine bidding to become NIH-designated Climate Change and Health Center
Center would be one of just 17 in the country funded by an NIH grant
The UC College of Medicine is teaming up with other UC colleges along with UC Health and Cincinnati Children's to submit an application to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to create a new research center at UC focused on the health impacts of climate change. The new center would be one of just 17 in the country funded through the first-of-its-kind competitive NIH grant program. More than 75 researchers from the three entities have joined the effort.
In a story published by the Cincinnati Business Courier about the proposed center, Ardythe Morrow, PhD, professor in the College of Medicine’s Department of Environmental and Public Health Sciences (DEPHS), said “That’s just a starting point. It might be hundreds.”
Ardythe Morrow, PhD, of the Department of Environmental and Public Health Sciences in the UC College of Medicine
Optimism is high for a grant award.
“We have a really strong case to make,” Morrow said. “We have a really strong team that already wants to run in this direction."
Initial research would likely be conducted out of existing space within the DEPHS. The university could give the center its own standalone space in the future, whether in the newly added UC Digital Futures building or elsewhere.
“The intellectual power in this university to achieve a center on global climate change and health is magnificent,” said George Leikauf, PhD, adjunct professor at DEPHS. “It’s powerful, and we’re going to try to harness it.”
Following a 2021 executive order describing an urgent need for both research solutions to address what President Joe Biden called a "climate crisis," the NIH unveiled a strategic framework for the Climate Change and Health Initiative in July 2022. The NIH, through the initiative, announced funding for the Climate Change and Health Research Center Development grant program earlier this year.
George Leikauf, PhD, of the Department of Environmental and Public Health Sciences in the UC College of Medicine
The scope of the potential research is vast, from epidemiology to urban planning.
The NIH has committed $30 million for the program, which is proceeding in two rounds. UC is applying in the second round, with applications due in November. The first round’s applications were due in May and will be announced in the coming months.
The grantees will each receive around $1 million per year for three years in direct and indirect funds. UC will use the money to fund research through pilot grants with academics and community partners. A certificate program is also possible, though it’s unclear where it would reside.
The NIH grant is exploratory, intended only as a launching pad toward a fully realized climate research infrastructure – like a bicycle ahead of an automobile, Leikauf said.
Senior leaders at the NIH have said the same, promising a “long-sustained” climate change research program.
“We expect this will lead to a center that is long range,” Leikauf told the Business Courier. “This is testing the waters, but it involves almost all the NIH institutes, which speaks to its magnitude and longevity. People at this level don’t get involved in something for three years and then walk away. There’s enough science to be done that all 17 of these centers could do work for decades. This is just going to get us started.”
Lead image at the top depicting climate change/piyaset/iStock
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