Working Together to Address Health Effects of Climate Change in Alaska Native Communities

The World Health Organization has named climate change as one of biggest threats to human health globally. The organization estimates that that one in four deaths can be traced to preventable environmental causes such as rising temperatures; extreme weather events; air pollution; wildfires; and compromised water, land, and food security. Although no region is immune to the effects, research shows that the most drastic changes in temperature are seen at high latitudes, including in the state of Alaska.

“Warming is much more dramatic at high latitudes, and we have already seen and are seeing quite significant changes” says Karsten Hueffer, Ph.D., dean of UAF College of Natural Science and Mathematics and principal investigator with the Alaska Alliance for Community Engagement — Climate and Health (AK ACE-CH). Temperature changes are between two and seven times more pronounced near the poles than in more temperate climates. The urgency of the situation in Alaska permeates the work of this community-engaged research project, one of four funded by the NIH Climate Change and Health Initiative. 

Alaska faces a variety of challenges when it comes to addressing climate change and its effects on human health. First, there’s the sheer size of the state. If you superimposed the map of Alaska on the contiguous 48 states, it would reach from southern Georgia to North Dakota — and all the way to California, if you include the Aleutian Island chain. More than half of the state has no roads that connect communities to the rest of the state, Hueffer points out. 

The population of Alaska includes more than 180,000 members of 229 federally recognized Tribes, many of whom depend on subsistence foods — foods to support life that are gathered, hunted, and fished from the land and waters. Climate change impacts the local air, water, and land and therefore has a direct and concentrated effect on the nutritional status and health of these Alaskan people, exacerbating already high levels of chronic diseases (such as diabetes, hypertension, and asthma). 

AK ACE-CH has three main goals:

• Prioritize Indigenous knowledge, attitudes, and beliefs about climate change and its impacts on health and well-being in Alaska 
• Co-produce new measures and strategies to assess multilevel climate and health risk and resilience factors in rural Alaska Native communities
• Implement Indigenous-led interventions to build adaptive capacity and holistic well-being in rural Alaska Native communities

The interdisciplinary AK ACE-CH team combines community expertise in Indigenous knowledge with university-based expertise in nutrition, fisheries, and wildlife management. Reflecting that community-engaged and interdisciplinary approach, the project has two multiple principal investigators (MPIs) and seven co-investigators. Hueffer serves as MPI with Stacy Rasmus, Ph.D., director of the Center for Alaska Native Health Research. Three of the co-investigators represent natural sciences, and four represent Tribal priorities and Indigenous knowledge of subsistence practices. The AK ACE-CH project is an example of how important it is to have flexible mechanisms that enable Indigenous communities to lead local research efforts and set Tribal priorities, Rasmus says. 

The project kicked off in July 2023, when the team met with Tribal representatives to establish a community-engaged partnership network and develop a work plan that reflects the priorities of the community members. They outlined shared interests, identified research and knowledge gaps, and developed preliminary ideas for projects to fill those gaps. Some planned projects include carrying out community-centered focus groups in four rural Alaska Native communities and using community-focused methodologies to identify climate change and health priorities at the local level.

As the Alliance grows and strengthens, the team is working on using language that community members relate to. Although scientists think in terms of environmental quality or health, community members may not always relate to those phrases. Fine-tuning terminology to reflect the local culture is part of the iterative process of working hand-in-hand with communities, Hueffer says. 

Another part of the project is gaining firsthand appreciation and experience of the Indigenous culture and traditional ways of the Alaska Native communities. In January 2024, Hueffer and Rasmus traveled to Emmonak, a community in the Yukon-Kuskokwim region. This region, which is about the size of Nebraska, is home to about 25,000 people spread out in 56 federally recognized Tribes. Subsistence foods make up 70-85% of the daily diet in this region. 

The MPIs itinerary included meetings with community and Tribal leaders to discuss the research project and develop Tribal data safety and data ownership and sharing plans. It also included a chance to accompany AK ACE-CH community co-investigator William Charles, a local Elder, and a young person to check under-ice blackfish traps. Engaging in this important subsistence activity is an integral part of understanding the culture of these communities as well as their vulnerability to the health effects of climate change. 

Hueffer says, “Participating in culturally important practices builds trust and understanding,” and it builds a foundation for working together.

The AK ACE-CH team is currently preparing for their second annual meeting where nearly half of the participants will be Alaska Native community members from rural villages. This meeting discussion topics will include plans for more community visits as well as data collection that the AK ACE-CH team anticipates will start in June 2024.

Climate change threatens the health of Native Alaskans, many of whom depend on locally hunted and fished subsistence foods. Funded by NIH, the Alaska Alliance for Community Engagement — Climate and Health (AK ACE-CH) is working with and in Alaskan communities to address these threats. 

MPI Hueffer on way to check fish traps.