Additional funding to the study of climate effects on human and animal health in the North

With the new grant, CLINF adds another 2.5 million NOK to the previously granted 30 million, which with other sources of funding provides a total budget of approximately 65 million NOK to be managed through the period of 2016 - 2024. At the overall level, CLINF studies climate-change effects on animal and human health including the associated impacts on Northern communities. More specifically, the new continued project CLINF-RUS will extend previous studies regarding the changing geographical distribution of infectious diseases in Siberia, support international harmonization of national health surveillance programmes, and engage in bilateral Nordic/Russian exchange of associated educational efforts. CLINF applies the holistic health concept called OneHealth and supports OPEN science.

CLINF-RUS is active under NordForsk´s "The Nordic-Russian Cooperation Programme in Higher Education and Research", where the new grant is provided within the "Nordic-Russian call for networks for risk and crisis management" (Nordic-Russian call for networks for risk and crisis management | NordForsk). CLINF's overall objective is to strengthen societal resilience with respect to the threat of changing animal and human exposure to infectious diseases. The rapid warming of Northern landscapes opens the North for immigration of organisms that carry infectious diseases. One example are ticks that carry dangerous viruses on their way north, another the re-emergence of long-time buried diseases such as anthrax when infected carcasses thaw and infectious agents are brought back to the ground surface. Since many Northern communities base their economy, culture, and beliefs on their relation to (semi-) domesticated animals and game, entire social structures are threatened if the health status of animal’s withers with climate change.

A broad scenario like the one depicted above requires highly integrated research, which is why CLINF employs a range of expertise such as climate scientists, ecologists, veterinarians, medics, social scientists, gender researchers, and indigenous specialists. CLINF-RUS research groups can be found at the universities of Umeå, SLU Uppsala, Oulu, Archangelsk, Moscow, and Tomsk (e.g.), as well as within the Thule Institute, the Arctic University, and the INTERACT Arctic infrastructure project. Together we maintain a bilaterally friendly exchange of science across the Nordic and Russian nations.