Mass General Brigham Study Finds Relationship between Doomsday Clock and Patterns of Mortality and Mental Health in the United States

Since 1947, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS) has used the metaphor of the Doomsday Clock as a means of communicating how close the human species is to self-imposed annihilation, represented as midnight. While early iterations of the clock focused more exclusively on the dangers of nuclear weapons, the BAS has also begun to consider other evolving existential dangers in recent decades, including climate change, disruptive technology and cyber risks, and political volatility. The Doomsday Clock is both famous and controversial. However, to date no known studies have explored the potential connection between the Doomsday Clock and health and mortality.

A new study by researchers at Mass General Brigham investigated the mortality and mental health correlates of the iconic Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ Doomsday Clock, using data published by the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the University of Washington’s Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation’s (IHME 2023) Global Burden of Disease project. The authors describe the work as an initial approach to understanding the connection between the Doomsday Clock and human and mental health, opening the door for more conversations around how social determinants of health (SDOH) may influence people’s wellbeing, which in turn may influence broader events. Results are published in The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

“This study represents a first step, with the inherent limitations thereof, but it suggests a bridge between the fate of the world, our psychology, and our health,” said first author Samuel Justin Sinclair, PhD, director of the Psychological Assessment and Research Service (PARSe) and a faculty member in the Department of Psychiatry at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), a founding member of Mass General Brigham. “This may sound intuitive, but it’s something that no one has looked at before. We hope it opens the door to further discussion.”

The study’s results indicate that Doomsday Clock settings closer to midnight (indicating greater risk) are associated with higher mortality from Alzheimer’s disease, suicide, unintentional injuries, and alcohol and substance-related disorders. Conversely, the researchers also observed lower mortality rates for malignant neoplasms, HIV, and diabetes mellitus as the clock ticked closer to midnight.

According to the authors, the findings indicate that during periods of greater risk to society, there may also be corresponding variations in mortality and health and that socio-political indicators such as the Doomsday Clock may be useful in capturing aspects of social determinants of health on a macro level.

“The wellbeing and functioning of individuals, societies, nations, international affairs, our species, and our planet are interrelated,” says senior author David Silbersweig, MD, chairman emeritus of the BWH Department of Psychiatry. “Further studies can address the complex, multi-directional interactions so as to address large-scale challenges and inform policy.”

Authorship: Samuel Justin Sinclair and David A. Silbersweig.

Disclosures: Silbersweig is a co-founder and SAB chair for Ceretype Neuromedicine (unrelated to this submission).

Funding: None

Paper cited: Sinclair JS et al. “Apocalypse now? Mortality and mental health correlates of the Doomsday Clock” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists DOI: /10.1080/00963402.2024.2439762