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Assessing vulnerability to natural hazards is at the heart of hazard risk reduction. However, many countries such as Australia lack measuring systems to quantity vulnerability for hazard risk evaluation. Drawing on 41 indicators from multiple data sources at the finest spatial unit of the Australian census, we re-forged the Cutter's classic vulnerability measuring framework by involving the '4D' quantification of built environment (diversity, design, density and distance), and constructed the first nationwide fine-grained measures of vulnerability for urban and rural locales, respectively. Our measures of vulnerability include five themes—(1) socioeconomic status; (2) demographics and disability; (3) minority and languages; (4) housing characteristics; and (5) built environment—that were further used to assess the inequality of vulnerability to three widely affected natural hazards in Australia (wildfires, floods, and earthquakes). We found the inequality of vulnerability in the affected areas of the three hazards in eight capital cities are more significant than that of their rural counterparts. The most vulnerable areas in capital cities were peri-urban locales which must be prioritised for hazard adaptation. Our findings contribute to the risk profiling and sustainable urban–rural development in Australia, and the broad understanding of place-based risk reduction in South Hemisphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Extreme heat, also known as the silent killer that conceal its lethal effect behind heat-related deaths, has become one of the deadliest natural hazards globally. However, the evaluation of heat risks in many countries remains incomplete, overlooking an important component on population health conditions in the evaluation framework. Drawing on the IPCC's risk assessment framework, this study presents, for the first time, a comprehensive heat health risk assessment in Australian capital cities, consisting of three individual indexes—the heat exposure index, heat hazard index and heat vulnerability index—at the finest census unit, and an overall heat health risk index (HHRI). By involving health-related indicators in heat risk assessment, our evaluation takes into account people's sensitivity to heat in developing the heat health risk indexes. Using the HHRI, we identify high heat risk areas appearing primarily in higher density residential areas with some distances away from the inner cities. We also find that the inequity of demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, housing features, and built environment features exists in areas with different levels of heat risks. Our findings contribute not only to profiling heat risks in Australian cities, but also empirically advance our understanding of place-based risk reduction in the Southern Hemisphere by linking climate science with health and spatial science research. • This study contributes the first heat health risk assessment in Australian cities. • This study generates the index of heat hazard, vulnerability and exposure and the overall index of heat health risk. • The assessment framework can be applied to other contexts and natural hazards. • Heat health risk related datasets are publicly available. • Spatial and socioeconomic inequity exists across areas with different levels of heat risk. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The warming trend over recent decades has already contributed to the increased prevalence of heat-vulnerable chronic diseases in many regions of the world. However, understanding the relationship between heat-vulnerable chronic diseases and heatwaves remains incomplete due to the complexity of such a relationship mingling with human society, urban and natural environments. Our study extends the Social Ecological Theory by constructing a tri-environmental conceptual framework (i.e., across social, built, and natural environments) and contributes to the first nationwide study of the relationship between heat-vulnerable chronic diseases and heatwaves in Australia. We utilize the random forest regression model to explore the importance of heatwaves and 48 tri-environmental variables that contribute to the prevalence of six types of heat-vulnerable diseases. We further apply the local interpretable model-agnostic explanations and the accumulated local effects analysis to interpret how the heat-disease nexus is mediated through tri-environments and varied across urban and rural space. The overall effect of heatwaves on diseases varies across disease types and geographical contexts (latitudes; inland versus coast). The local heat-disease nexus follows a J-shape function—becoming sharply positive after a certain threshold of heatwaves—reflecting that people with the onset of different diseases have various sensitivity and tolerance to heatwaves. However, such effects are relatively marginal compared to tri-environmental variables. We propose a number of policy implications on reducing urban-rural disparity in healthcare access and service distribution, delineating areas, and identifying the variations of sensitivity to heatwaves across urban/rural space and disease types. Our conceptual framework can be further applied to examine the relationship between other environmental problems and health outcomes. • This study constructs a tri-environmental framework to examine heat-disease relationship. • It contributes the first nationwide fine-grained study on heat-disease relationship in Australia. • It evaluates importance of heatwaves and 48 tri-environmental variables on six chronic diseases. • It finds that people with onset of diseases have various sensitivity and tolerance to heatwaves. • The effect of heatwaves on diseases is marginal compared to that of tri-environmental variables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]