Maria Nilsson

I´m a professor of Public Health, with the orientation climate change and health, based at the department of Epidemiology and Global Health, Umeå University, Sweden. My PhD is in epidemiology and public health sciences and my main research focus has for many years been weather, climate and climate change and health, with a specific interest for adaptation and vulnerable populations.

I lead research in low to high income countries, some examples of topics of doctoral students over the years: heat exposure and health outcomes in Costa Rican sugarcane harvesters, weather and weather extremes in association to mental health in Vietnam, climate change aspects on health in northern Sweden, household mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions and dengue risk communication in local Indonesian communities understanding knowledge, attitudes, and practice to improve action. In recent years I have started a research line on climate change communication and behavior change and lead a WP in the Horizon project Catalyse on the topic, starting in 2022.

I was co-author and the integrating editor for health in the 2015 "Lancet Commission - Health and climate change: policy responses to protect public health". Since the start of the global “Lancet Countdown 2030 on Health and Climate Change" in 2016 I have co-led the working group on adaptation, planning, and resilience for health. In September 2021 I became the chair of the new initiative Lancet Countdown in Europe, established as a research collaboration with the mission to monitor health and climate change with annual updates for the region. The Lancet Countdown in Europe is a partner organisation of the European Climate and Health Observatory, a joint initiative of the European Commission and the European Environment Agency.

In connection to my projects, I am engaged in knowledge translation to increase awareness and understanding of climate change and health impacts, working actively to feed research evidence into policy and practice.  

I was awarded a fellowship in 2017 for global health leadership from the Swedish Institute for Global Health Transformation (SIGHT), under the auspices of the Swedish Royal academy of Sciences. I was invited as a member of two Working Groups of the European Academies Science Advisory Council in 2018 – 2021, one on climate change and health and one on decarbonisation of buildings. In 2022 I became a member of the health committee of the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences. In 2022 I was nominated to the Frontiers Planet Prize by Umeå University.

I am the Editor in Chief for the science journal Global Health Action. Under my leadership the journal seeks to contribute a concrete, hands-on approach to addressing the global health challenges brought to the fore by the impact of globalization.

I have publications in high impact journals such as the Lancet, Lancet Planetary health, Lancet Public Health, and the BMJ.