Leveraging the universally shared value of protecting children, Perera’s Children’s Health and the Peril of Climate Change (OUP, October 2022) is a call to action to replace denial and despair around climate change with purpose and commitment for a healthier, more sustainable future.
Lola Adedokun, Executive Director of the Aspen Global Innovators Group, will moderate the discussion.
About the Speakers
Frederica P. Perera is professor of Environmental Health Sciences and founder of the Columbia Center for Children’s Environmental Health where she served as director from 1998- 2019. She now leads the Center’s Program in Translational Research. Dr. Perera is internationally recognized for pioneering the field of molecular epidemiology, utilizing biomarkers to understand links between environmental exposures and disease. She and her colleagues have applied advanced molecular and imaging techniques within longitudinal cohort studies of pregnant women and their children, with the goal of identifying preventable environmental risk factors for adverse birth outcomes, developmental and behavioral disorders, asthma, obesity and other diseases in children. The exposures studied include toxic chemicals, pesticides and air pollution, with particular focus on adverse effects of prenatal and early childhood exposures. Her current research addresses the multiple impacts on children’s health and development of climate change and air pollution due to fossil fuel emissions and the health and economic benefits of policies to reduce those emissions. She is the author of over 400 publications, including 350 peer-reviewed articles, and has received numerous honors.
Lola Adedokun is the Executive Director of the Aspen Global Innovators Group at the Aspen Institute and co-Chair of the Aspen Institute Forum on Women and Girls. She joined the Aspen Institute in December 2021, where she leads a dynamic team advancing a portfolio of programs that expand opportunities for and access to health and prosperity for people living at the world’s margins globally and domestically. Lola joined the Aspen Institute after 14 years with the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, where she administered over $150 million in grant-making as both Director of the African Health Initiative and Director of the Child Well-being Program. The African Health Initiative strengthened health systems in sub-Saharan Africa by supporting partnerships and large-scale models of care that link implementation research and workforce training directly to the delivery of integrated primary healthcare. Leading the Child Well-being Program, she supported intergenerational work that bolstered culturally-, geographically- and locally-relevant programs that promote children’s healthy development, prevent maltreatment, and create improved and more equitable outcomes for economically disadvantaged children and families. She earned dual B.A. degrees with Honors in Health Policy & Society and Sociology from Dartmouth College and an M.P.H. from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health.