Remote sensing for health monitoring in incarcerated populations during extreme weather events

Project Description

Local temperature extremes can impact the health of vulnerable populations such as prisoners and older people. However, high-resolution environmental data is often limited, reducing our ability to fully understand how temperature extremes may result in poor health outcomes for vulnerable populations locally.

In a preliminary study undertaken by the UKHSA Geospatial team in collaboration with the Health Equity team, we incorporated the application of earth observation (EO) data to draw insights into the prison environment. Using remotely sensed land surface temperatures (LST) focused on prison compounds across London, the exploratory analysis demonstrates that prison compounds not only experience a wider range of LST than that seen across the rest of London, but also that prison compounds reach quite high LSTs in summer and low LSTs in winter. Living in consistently cold or hot conditions can have severe health impacts on vulnerable populations. Although we recognise that LST does not tell us directly about indoor air temperatures inside prison buildings, it can give us an indication of building and compound heat externally, allowing us to compare this between localities.

This project will provide a comprehensive population health experience, including learning about surveillance systems for health, data analyses and statistics, understanding various infectious disease control programmes and use of evidence to inform and support the development of national policy.