Garrison Bruce

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Garrison
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Bruce
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  • Article
    Lessening the hazards of Florida red tides: a common sense approach
    (Frontiers Media, 2020-07-09) Hoagland, Porter ; Kirkpatrick, Barbara ; Jin, Di ; Kirkpatrick, Gary ; Fleming, Lora E. ; Ullmann, Steven G. ; Beet, Andrew R. ; Hitchcock, Gary ; Harrison, Kate K. ; Li, Zongchao C. ; Garrison, Bruce ; Diaz, Roberto E. ; Lovko, Vince
    In the Gulf of Mexico, especially along the southwest Florida coast, blooms of the dinoflagellate Karenia brevis are a coastal natural hazard. The organism produces a potent class of toxins, known as brevetoxins, which are released following cell lysis into ocean or estuarine waters or, upon aerosolization, into the atmosphere. When exposed to sufficient levels of brevetoxins, humans may suffer from respiratory, gastrointestinal, or neurological illnesses. The hazard has been exacerbated by the geometric growth of human populations, including both residents and tourists, along Florida’s southwest coast. Impacts to marine organisms or ecosystems also may occur, such as fish kills or deaths of protected mammals, turtles, or birds. Since the occurrence of a severe Karenia brevis bloom off the southwest Florida coast three-quarters of a century ago, there has been an ongoing debate about the best way for humans to mitigate the impacts of this hazard. Because of the importance of tourism to coastal Florida, there are incentives for businesses and governments alike to obfuscate descriptions of these blooms, leading to the social amplification of risk. We argue that policies to improve the public’s ability to understand the physical attributes of blooms, specifically risk communication policies, are to be preferred over physical, chemical, or biological controls. In particular, we argue that responses to this type of hazard must emphasize maintaining the continuity of programs of scientific research, environmental monitoring, public education, and notification. We propose a common-sense approach to risk communication, comprising a simplification of the public provision of existing sources of information to be made available on a mobile website.
  • Presentation
    CHANS : the characteristics of cost-effective policy responses for harmful algal blooms [poster]
    ( 2015-11-11) Hoagland, Porter ; Kirkpatrick, Barbara ; Kirkpatrick, Gary ; Hitchcock, Gary ; Ullmann, Steven G. ; Reich, Andrew ; Fleming, Lora E. ; Jin, Di ; Beet, Andrew R. ; Li, Cathy ; Garrison, Bruce ; Lovko, Vince ; Kohler, Kate ; Rudge, Katrin
    A growing concern for coastal management is the choice of appropriate public or private responses to HABs as a natural hazard. Considerable efforts have been devoted to understanding the scientific aspects of HABs, including their distributions in space and time, their ecological roles, and the nature of their toxic effects, among others. Much energy also has been directed at exploring socio-economic impacts and identifying potential management actions, including actions to prevent, control, or mitigate blooms. Using blooms of Florida red tide (Karenia brevis) as a case study, we develop an approach to the choice of policy responses to K. brevis blooms. Importantly, several new types of public health, environmental, and socio-economic impacts now are beginning to be revealed, including human gastrointestinal and potential neurological illnesses; morbidities and mortalities of protected species, including manatees, cetaceans, and sea turtles; increased numbers of hospital emergency room visits for the elderly; increased respiratory morbidities in workers, such as beach lifeguards; and potential reduced K- 12 school attendance. Optimal policy responses to this hazard are likely to depend critically upon why and where a bloom occurs, its spatial and temporal scales and toxicity, and the nature of its impacts. In the face of significant ongoing scientific uncertainties, and given estimates of impacts, we find that policies to expand and stabilize scientific research programs and environmental monitoring efforts, to develop and implement education programs for both residents and tourists, and to communicate the physical aspects of blooms to the public in a timely fashion are likely optimal.
  • Presentation
    CHANS : modeling the dynamics of HABs, human communities, and policy choices along the Florida Gulf Coast
    ( 2015-11-19) Hoagland, Porter ; Kirkpatrick, Barbara ; Kirkpatrick, Gary ; Hitchcock, Gary ; Ullmann, Steven G. ; Reich, Andrew ; Fleming, Lora E. ; Jin, Di ; Beet, Andrew R. ; Li, Cathy ; Garrison, Bruce ; Lovko, Vince ; Kohler, Kate ; Rudge, Katrin
    Coupled human-nature systems (CHANS) involve dynamic interactions between humans and nature, often influenced by and affecting the distinct dynamic characteristics of each component. We present an overview of an ongoing interdisciplinary research program focused on a specific type of systems that couple expanding and fluctuating human coastal populations to episodic blooms of toxic marine algae, drawing examples primarily from human interactions with blooms of the toxic dinoflagellate Karenia brevis from the eastern Gulf of Mexico (“Florida red tides”). We introduce a set of HAB Symposium “speed” presentations and associated posters based on multi-disciplinary research. Using extant, but extraordinary, data to specify empirical models, this program of research has focused on characterizing the influence of anthropogenic sources on K. brevis blooms, assessing the public health and economic impacts of these blooms in an exposure-response framework, and defining the choice of appropriate human policy responses to the hazard. We present examples of the generic aspects of CHANS systems in the context of Florida red tides, and we discuss also some of the challenges involved in compiling and analyzing the relevant data to support our positive and normative analytical efforts.