Eztia started as a passion project to solve a years-long personal frustration with using ice packs for various reasons, ranging from chronic pain to backpacking in hot humid climates to joint injuries from extreme sports. Regardless of application, there was a common thread in my suboptimal user experience—I often didn’t have a freezer around to store the ice, I couldn’t attach it to myself, and it melted on me.
I was in medical school at the time, but had previously trained in materials engineering. I started researching user-friendly and environmentally friendly cooling materials for people, and ended up designing HydraVolt™, the water-powered technology behind Eztia today. After earning my medical degree, I developed HydraVolt™ in lab and integrated the technology into the Arctic Patch, a cooling wearable to protect people from extreme heat in an energy-efficient way.
It’s clear that heat has been increasing in severity and prevalence over the years and around the world. Heat affects everyone, from world-class athletes to construction workers to people who are currently unhoused, with real consequences for one’s health and ability to put food on the table. I believe that extreme heat, and extreme weather at large, deserve more attention and will come to a head when it’s no longer possible to ignore.
Eztia’s work in health-centered climate adaptation is two-fold. First, we make sustainable products like the Arctic Patch to help people stay healthy in changing climates. Second, we educate and advocate by researching and publishing at the intersection of health and climate. To change the world for the better, we must understand it; build dialogue and support within it; and take action in ways that are inclusive to overlooked communities and responsible to the planet that we call home.
Thank you for being part of the movement for a health-centered response to climate change. We’re grateful to work towards a thriving future together.
Tiffany Yeh
FOUNDER
