Health Impact Assessment of PM10 and PM2.5 in 35 Southeast and East Asian cities

摘要

Background: Several collaborative air pollution studies were conducted in Western countries (e.g., Apheis, APHENA). However, similar attempts were rare in Asian countries. Aim: To assess annual health-impacts of PM10 and PM2.5 in Asian cities with population more than 1 million as well as the capitals of Southeast and East Asian countries in one year (2009). Methods: We selected 35 cities from Korea, Japan, Philippines, Singapore, and Viet Nam (No. of combined population: 54,793,747). We obtained annual concentrations of particulate matter (PM2.5, PM10, or TSP) measured at urban background stations in 2009. When PM2.5 or PM10 was not available, certain conversion factors were used to estimate PM2.5 or PM10 from other particulate matter indicators (e.g., TSP, SPM). We also obtained annual mortality among people over 30 years old due to the following reasons: total mortality, total mortality excluding external causes, cardiopulmonary mortality, and lung cancer mortality. We calculated number of long-term attributable cases assuming that there is a causal relationship between particulate matter and the observed health effects. Following the WHO Air quality guidelines, we conducted the health impact assessment for the scenario of reducing the annual mean value of PM10 and PM2.5 to the levels of 20 μg/m3 and 10μg/m3, respectively. Results: Annual mean (observed or estimated) concentrations of PM2.5 and PM10 ranged from 9.9 to 103.8 μg/m3 and 15.1 to 173.0 μg/m3, respectively. Reducing long-term exposure to PM10 and PM2.5 to the levels of above-defined values would have prevented about 40,000 early deaths in the 35 cities. Among the 40,000 early deaths, one-thirds was associated with cardiopulmonary mortality and one-eighths was associated with lung cancer mortality. Conclusion: The current air pollution levels in Southeast and East Asian countries have a non-negligible public health impact.