New research on economic value of the mental health impacts of flooding aims to better inform interventions and guide funding
In her final episode hosting Groundwater Rising (before handing over to new host Helen Banyard), host Katie interviews Matt Georges, founder of Orbital Applied Economics about mental health and flooding.
Historically, investment in flood prevention and flood defences has mainly been in physical structures. But more and more is being understood about the importance of community flood resilience, and behind this lies the issue of mental health. Being flooded affects mental health greatly, but it's hard to put an economic value on mental health impacts... which means its importance may be being under considered in decisions about which interventions to fund.
Matt is leading the ground-breaking FloodMind research project that aims to fill a research gap (very little has been done about mental health and flooding) and then work towards a mathematical model that can better understand the mental health impacts and their economic value - specifically in terms of groundwater flooding.
In a funding decision-making context that often boils down to cost, the aim of Flood Mind is to provide more of an evidence-based platform for mental health to be given more importance in future flood scheme funding.
To find out more about FloodMind, visit floodmind.co.uk