ZOOM

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/88904516248

Meeting ID: 889 0451 6248
Passcode: 581157

Abstract:
Climate change is increasing exposure to high temperatures, with growing implications for maternal health. Prior demographic research has focused on health risks during pregnancy and on how heat affects conceptions, but less is known about how heat influences birth timing and mode of delivery. This talk presents findings from two complementary studies, one focusing on North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany (2000–2023), and the other on Ecuador (2015–2024). Both studies rely on daily administrative birth records linked to high-resolution temperature data and exploit day-to-day weather variation within locations using fixed-effects models to estimate the causal effects of same-day and lagged temperature exposure on time and mode of delivery. Across both contexts, hot days (≥24°C) increase births on the day of exposure and the following day (by up to 4.8% in Ecuador and 4.5% in Germany), indicating that heat accelerates labor and shifts births forward, reducing gestational length. In Ecuador, heat exposure also reduces cesarean deliveries by approximately 1.8 percentage points, with effects concentrated on the day of exposure and no lagged response, suggesting contemporaneous changes in clinical practices. These findings show that heat exposure affects both biological processes and healthcare decision-making, with implications for maternal care systems under increasing climate stress.