Air pollution and lung cancer, Effects of long-term exposure to residential green space, Land-use models, all among his fields of research. And there are many, many more. Mark Nieuwenhuijsen grew up besides a farm, animals, grass, and the wide skies of the Netherlands. His curriculum would fill the space on this page and we could gain sight of the lasting changes his groundbreaking research is shaping.
PhD Director of the Urban Planning, Environment and Health initiative and the Climate, Air pollution, Nature and Urban Health research program at ISGlobal in Barcelona, Spain, he speak at the IV Global Summit Science, Nature and Health: Module 1 · Nature, Health & Urban Innovation.
He has edited 8 books; co-authored 39 book chapters and more than 700 peer-reviewed scientific papers.He received the John Goldsmith Award from the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology for Outstanding Contributions to Environmental Epidemiology, and is the top 1% most cited scientists worldwide according to Clarivate. He was ranked #1 scientist in Urban Health, he leads the biennial Urban Transitions Conference, serves as Editor-in-Chief of Environment International, and was President of the International Society for Environmental Epidemiology (2020–2021).
Having led five major European Commission–funded research consortia, including the current UBDPolicy, he directs the European Urban Burden of Disease Project.
Minimalist, precise, without fanfare, with results that enrich the soil of a growing body of knowledge aimed at improving people’s lives through nature.
“I grew up in a small village, rural countryside, with lots of nature around me, always running around and on the farm. So in that way I’ve always had nature in the Netherlands, and have been strongly connected to nature with everything, where everything happened.
“Then I moved to cities, like London and Barcelona, but also here in Barcelona I live actually in the forest in Collserola, so I look out over trees all the time and then a little bit later I hope to go running in the forest. Wonderful”.
Green Spaces, Health and Research
“I’ve always had an interest in the environment and I did an Environmental Science degree and then I specialized in the impacts of the environment on health. For a long time I was studying the relationship between air pollution and health because there is a lot of interest. We know that air pollution is bad. And over these years, we’ve developed a lot of evidence to show that air pollution has an effect on many different organs, and people die earlier, etc.
“And then at one stage, I started also asking myself about what is good. Not only to study the bad, but also what is good. And then I got the opportunity to go for a EU call to look at the effects of green spaces on people’s health.
“Before I started, there were a lot of studies from psychologists with people looking at photos and seeing if they felt better or worse depending on if they looked at green versus other environments. So before I started, there were not many what we call ‘epidemiological’ studies where you look at people and their health in general.
“We got funded through a project called Phenotype, where we did many epidemiological studies around Europe to look at the health effects of green spaces. And what we found in all our studies is that being exposed to more green space was very good for people in all kinds of ways in terms of their health.
“I looked at air pollution followed by green spaces and then at other exposures in particular in a city area. I decided to study more holistically what is happening in the city in terms of environmental exposure. And then of course you look at heat, you see the potential benefits of more green spaces to reduce its effects, also to reduce some of the noise effects. What we see are the many, many benefits on health from green spaces in our cities”.
Clear examples of health through nature
“Unfortunately, we see there is a real lack of green space in cities. And I think it’s particularly the lack of green space that leads to adverse health effects like people getting sick, dying more prematurely. So fortunately now we see a movement that cities are greening, putting in more green”.
“We’ve done quite a few studies around this, where you see if you put in more green, people, have better health, physical health, and mental health, in particular. Mental health is strongly linked to having enough access to green space. For people living in greener versus non green areas, the difference is big. And also when you increase green spaces, you see that mental health problems are also going down and e.g. people sleep better. It’s a strong effect.
“Most of the time what we see is that people living in greener areas have less depression, and less anxiety. Also people are taking less medication for these disorders, and fewer visits to psychologists and psychiatrists.
“During the Global Summit I’m going to give some examples of green spaces and what are the benefits for the people. I’m going to give some concrete examples of specific cities, including my own city in Barcelona.
“There is a large difference between green spaces regarding the quality of it, and this is very important. And also aspects of biodiversity, because we see evidence that when the green space is more biodiverse, there are more health benefits.
Ph: Courtesy Mark Nieuwenhuijsen
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