Neighborhood green spaces may protect against Type 2 diabetes found in women, according to a study released earlier this month.
The study, in the June edition of the journal Environmental Epidemiology, said it is among the first studies in the United States to examine the risk of developing Type 2 diabetes among women in the nation using historical data cohorts and internationally recognized satellite vegetation imaging.
The study examined the role of access to residential greenness as an environmental contributor to Type 2 diabetes, said lead researcher Melissa Fiffer. “Our goal was to investigate the role of population-level factors in the neighborhood environment that could potentially be modified or improved through public health interventions,” Fiffer told POLITICO’s E&E News.
The researchers used satellite-based Landsat imagery to quantify greenness on the normalized difference vegetation index that scientists across the world use to measure greenness. The authors found that even an incremental change (0.1 on the index) in the amount of green space in the neighborhoods had a 4 percent reduction in the risk of Type 2 diabetes among women.
