June 30, 2023 – Older Americans who live in warmer climates are likely to have more vision problems than older Americans who live in cooler climates, a brand new study finds.
People aged 65 and over who live in counties with temperatures above 15 °C have a 44% higher risk of severe visual impairment than people in that age group who live in counties with average temperatures below 10 °C, based on the study, published in 2018. Ophthalmic epidemiology.
According to the study, the chance is 24 percent higher for people in counties with a mean temperature above 55 degrees Celsius, and for people in counties with a mean temperature above 50 degrees Celsius, the chance is 14 percent higher.
The association between higher local temperatures and vision problems was strongest in people aged 65 to 79 years in comparison with people aged 80 and over, in men in comparison with women, and in whites in comparison with blacks.
Researchers on the University of Toronto examined results from the 2012-2017 American Community Survey, which asked 1.7 million older adults many questions, including: “Is this person blind or has serious difficulty seeing, even when wearing glasses?” Average temperature data was obtained from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
“This association between visual impairment and average county temperature is very concerning if future research finds the association is causal,” said lead writer Esme Fuller-Thomson, PhD, director of the University of Toronto's Institute of Life Course and Aging and a professor within the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work and the Department of Family and Community Medicine, in a press release. “With climate change, we expect global temperatures to increase. It will be important to monitor whether the prevalence of visual impairment among older adults increases in the future.”
The study was unable to make any conclusions in regards to the connection and called for further investigations. However, possible causes include increased UV radiation, air pollution, infections and the breakdown of folic acid as temperatures rise.