Earlier this week a Duke university study concluded that one in four HIV patients were sexually abused as children. Over 600 patients, aged 20-71, were involved in the two-year long study.

The majority of the patients in the study, titled the Coping with HIV/AIDS in the Southeast (Chase), had at one point in their lifetimes been victims of sexual or physical abuse. In addition, fifty percent of the patients were found to have suffered three of more traumatic life experiences, such as sexual or physical abuse, and also domestic violence, the loss of a child, or a loved one’s suicide attempt or completion.

These traumatic experiences, particularly ones in childhood, were also linked to worse health overall among the patients.

By checking and following up on the patients intermittently for a two year period, researchers were able to find links between traumatic experiences, HIV-related behaviors and poorer health conditions.

More traumatic experiences were also linked to patients engaging in unprotected sex, missing proper, antiretroviral medications, trips to the emergency room and hospitalizations. Patients who had been victims of trauma were much more likely to have their health decline or to pass away during the two-year period.

“For whatever outcome we looked at, psychological trauma ended up being a predictor of worse medical outcomes and poorer health-related behaviors,” said lead author Brian Pence, a Duke associate professor of community and family medicine and global health.

Pence went on to say these findings stress the significance of judging a patient’s trauma history when being given HIV care. The results, Pence hopes, can help HIV programs be structured into an environment that advocates safer sex practices, stricter adherence to medicine and better health results for patients receiving aid.

The most surprising part of the study was that the effects of past trauma on recent behavior and health was unable to be explained by normal factors.

“We would expect people with a history of exposure to trauma to have post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression or other mental health concerns, like drug abuse or poor coping skills, and that these things in turn would more fully explain why they had lower adherence to their medications and worse health,” Pence said.

“But, we found that trauma history was still associated with bad health outcomes independent of mental health status, drug use or coping styles. So we have more to learn about exactly how past traumatic experiences exert influence on behaviors and health outcomes years down the road.”

The study is set to appear in the April 1 edition of the Journal of Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndromes (which can be found online here), with a supplementary editorial. The National Institute of Mental Health helped support the study.

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Climate change is likely to harm California’s economy by reducing the types of natural, non-irrigated vegetation available for livestock forage and the ability of forest ecosystems to store carbon dioxide, according to a peer-reviewed study published in the scientific journal Climatic Change.

The ability of ecosystems to store carbon dioxide is a key part of implementing the state’s climate law, the Global Warming Solutions Act, also known as Assembly Bill 32 or AB 32.

“Much of the talk about climate change in California has been about the impacts of sea level rise and droughts,” said study coauthor Linwood Pendleton, director of ocean and coastal policy at Duke University’s Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, acting chief economist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and study author. “Our work shows that even the gritty worlds of cattle ranching and forestry may take it on the chin as California skies become increasingly carbon-rich.”

The study was conducted by researchers from Duke University, Environmental Defense Fund, The Nature Conservancy, Conservation Biology Institute, USDA Forest Service, Stanford University and the University of California at Santa Barbara. It examines how climate change will impact the fundamental character of California’s ecosystems and the valuable services that they provide to the economy.

To analyze the impact to carbon sequestration and natural, non-irrigated livestock forage—two important ecosystem services that contribute to the state’s economy—the researchers used climatic change scenario models from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and three atmospheric-oceanic models.

The researchers identified that climate change would cause a consistent decline in conifer woodlands and forests through the end of the century that could decrease the amount of carbon storage in forestlands and harm the forestry industry.

They also determined that climate change is likely to alter the amount and timing of rain, hail and snow in California, resulting in a 15 to 70 percent increase in shrub lands and a consistent decline in natural, non-irrigated forage production for livestock.

“A less stable climate will reduce the ability of natural landscapes to support cattle grazing, so ranchers may have to grow or buy extra hay instead of getting it for free from nature, as they do now,” said lead report author Rebecca Shaw, Ph.D., associate vice president of EDF’s Land, Water and Wildlife program and a working group member of the IPCC.

“We calculated that replacing lost forage caused by climate change with extra hay will hike costs for the California ranching industry by up to $235 million per year by 2070,” said Shaw. “That’s why it’s important for policymakers to better understand the value of services that nature provides to California’s economy, so that they can work to protect our natural resources and the economy in the face of climate change.”

“Fortunately, California’s Global Warming Solutions Act provides new economic opportunities for landowners—both inside and outside California—to be part of the climate solution,” said economist Belinda Morris, a report coauthor and regional director of EDF’s Center for Conservation Incentives.

“Landowners can earn credits for capturing carbon on their land that they can sell to offset industrial carbon emissions. These credits will bring in a whole new revenue stream that can benefit the ranching industry, helping ranchers to keep ranching.” Carbon credits are an integral part of the carbon cap-and-trade program that is scheduled to begin this year under the Global Warming Solutions Act. It allows for 8 percent of the law’s carbon emission reduction goals to be achieved by offsetting emissions with carbon credits.

“EDF is working with landowners, academic institutions and others to develop cost-effective methods for capturing carbon on rangelands that could generate new revenue streams for ranchers as part of a carbon credits market, while also improving soil fertility,” Morris said.

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