# Acquisition of disability and chronic morbidity by older Indians following extreme urban coastal flooding events

> **NIH NIH R21** · UNIV OF MARYLAND, COLLEGE PARK · 2024 · $223,753

## Abstract

Project Summary
Older populations in low and middle income countries are often highly dependent on children and other family
members for their economic and physical wellbeing. Elders’ housing and households, however, may be
adversely impacted by extreme climate events. Extreme rainfall events have already produced more frequent
major coastal urban flooding events in India. Its four largest coastal cities, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai and
Surat, each experienced extreme flooding events in 2005-2007. Although these extreme flooding events were
closely spaced relative to each other, they were each at the time they struck the largest flooding event either of
the past three or four decades (Kolkata, Surat) or in recorded meteorological history (Mumbai, Chennai). The
2005-2007 events coincidentally occurred between two successive survey data collection waves of a major
panel survey of Indian households, the India Human Development Survey (IHDS). We use pre- and post-flood
IHDS panel observation in a decomposition analysis of flood impacts on disability and chronic morbidity
acquisition among individuals age 50 and above. Informed by a social-vulnerability theoretical framework, this
decomposition analysis uses as predictors both pre-flood socio-demographic and economic characteristics and
pre-flood to post-flood housing condition changes, residential mobility, and living arrangement changes. The
aims of the study are to estimate India’s urban older population’s: (1) acquisition of disability and chronic
morbidity associated with experiencing an extreme coastal-urban flooding event; (2) housing and living
arrangement change, kin proximity, and individual and household mobility associated with the flooding events;
(3) extent to which changes in housing, living arrangements, and individual and household mobility were
mechanisms responsible for acquisition of disability and chronic morbidity; and (4) disparities in adverse
impacts on health and family-household stability by pre-flooding individual, family, and household socio-
economic and socio-demographic characteristics. The substantive findings and methodological developments
of the study are expected to have generalizabilty for examining threats to elders’ health and wellbeing from
extreme climate events globally.

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10790912
- **Project number:** 1R21AG085047-01
- **Recipient organization:** UNIV OF MARYLAND, COLLEGE PARK
- **Principal Investigator:** MICHAEL S. RENDALL
- **Activity code:** R21 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2024
- **Award amount:** $223,753
- **Award type:** 1
- **Project period:** 2024-09-17 → 2026-05-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10790912

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10790912, Acquisition of disability and chronic morbidity by older Indians following extreme urban coastal flooding events (1R21AG085047-01). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-24 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10790912. Licensed CC0.

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