Doctoral Dissertation Research: Social and Spatio-Temporal Patterns of Arsenic Exposure and Effects

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This research project examines the changing geographies of exposure to arsenic-contaminated drinking water and the resulting human health effects of respiratory disease and impaired lung function. Utilizing a political ecology of disease framework and spatial statistical methods, the objective of the project is to investigate the social, economic, political and environmental factors that lead to and perpetuate exposure to arsenic and its resulting health effects. The research findings are expected to advance knowledge within health and medical geography by expanding understanding about how multiple factors intersect to both create and mitigate risk of toxic exposures over space and time. This advancement of knowledge will have important important implications for policy evaluation and the planning of future mitigation strategies by highlighting priority locations and groups at risk. Although this research focuses on Bangladesh, its findings will be broadly applicable to many areas of the world reporting arsenic poisoning from contaminated groundwater including Chile, Taiwan, and parts of the United States. Arsenic occurs naturally in the sediments of Bangladesh, though with high spatial variability due to changes in local geology. At the same time, household and individual exposure to that arsenic varies due to social, economic, and political factors that influence both access to wells and the likelihood that a well taps a contaminated aquifer. Therefore, understanding the relationship between arsenic exposure and human health demands an understanding of human-environment interactions and how they vary across spatial and temporal scales. Situated in this context, this research is guided by three main questions: (1) How does arsenic exposure in rural Bangladesh vary spatially, temporally, and with social/demographic factors? (2) What factors influence a household's behavior to access an uncontaminated water source? (3) What are the consequences of chronic arsenic exposure for lung function and respiratory disease? The research will contribute a new methodological approach to the study of arsenic and health that combines a Bayesian cluster detection model with spatial regression techniques. Together these techniques will highlight risk factors and areas of persistent arsenic exposure and the role of arsenic exposure in lung disease. In addition to novel results, the theoretical framing of this study will provide an example for incorporating geographic theory on human-environment interactions and political ecology into health studies, improving future research.