Early life conditions, SES and resilience to later life adverse events

The research on the health impact of exposure to disasters points at an increase in physical, psychological and social consequences. However, this field has mostly focused on single, disastrous events. Less is known about the impact of the chronic stress of milder, repeated exposures to natural and human-made crises. An example of such human-made crisis is the 
growing earthquake activity in the province of Groningen that is caused by natural gas extraction. Although the magnitude of the earthquakes in Groningen is relatively mild, the frequency of occurrence is high in recent years (Vlek, 2019). Using data from the health records obtained from general practices, Dückers et al. (2021) show that exposure to the Groningen earthquakes leads to an increase in suicidality, but they did not find an increase in the health issues presented to the general practitioners in the affected regions. There are several potential caveats for this finding. First, because the Groningen earthquakes are mild, the health effects might also be relatively small, therefore, not severe enough to require medical intervention. Nevertheless, these health effects might be detectable using various screening questionnaires and biomarkers collected in the Lifelines study.
    Second, the health effects might not be present in all population groups. Over the past forty years, a growing literature has focused on socio-economic health disparities (Inchley and Currie, 2016). Although the health differences among socioeconomic status (SES) groups are well-described, studies identifying the mechanisms of health variation within SES groups are still weak (Ferrer and Palmer, 2004; Hoffmann et al., 2018). Ferrer and Palmer (2004) found significant variation in health in lower income groups. They found that the health status scores of the healthiest 25% individuals in the lower income groups are equal to those of the healthiest 25% in high income groups. In other work, Schöllgen (2011) found sizable differences in physical function and depressive symptoms across and within education groups. From a policy perspective, socio-economic status of individuals is difficult to alter, but sizable health gains can be made by focusing on the determinants of health disparities within the socio-economic groups. In this project, we aim to understand whether the health effects of earthquakes differ between and within the socio-economic status groups. In addition we will investigate the determinants of the within-group variation in the health effects.
    Third, from our previous work with Lifelines data (Alessie et al., 2019, project OV14-0221) we know that adult health is affected by the economic conditions at the time of birth. The literature (Scholte et al., 2017; Almond and Currie, 2011; Almond et al., 2018) also shows that early life conditions can affect the resilience to late life shocks. Hence, this project will also study how conditions and events faced early in life affect the health effects of the Groningen earthquakes. 
    Within this framework, we are requesting data on the health status of the individuals that can potentially be affected by the stress caused by the earthquakes and socio-economic conditions. This includes information on lifestyle, cardiovascular health, mental health and wellbeing. In addition, we need socio-economic and socio-demographic information. Finally, we also request any information about the childhood conditions and adversity. In addition, we want to be able to link this information geographically to earthquake data and to provincial level unemployment data, that we aim to use as an exogenous indicator of economic conditions at birth.