Abstract:
This study disaggregates health impacts over regions and over time, providing an assessment of air pollution's effect on mortality rates in China on a spatial scale from 2004 to 2012. Results showed that national PM2.5 related deaths from stroke, ischemic heart disease and lung cancer increased from approximately 800,000 cases in 2004 to over 1.2 million cases in 2012. The health burden exhibited strong spatial variations, with high attributable deaths concentrated in regions including the Beijing–Tianjin Metropolitan Region, Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta, Sichuan Basin, Shandong, Wuhan Metropolitan Region, Changsha–Zhuzhou–Xiangtan, Henan, and Anhui, which have heavy air pollution, high population density, or both. The correlation between the health burden and rapidly urbanizing areas should be used by urban planners and policy makers for air pollution prevention and control. The study includes health burden datasets that make it possible to further explore the determinants of these health impacts.
Author:
Miaomiao Liu, Yining Huang, Zongwei Ma, Zhou Jin, Xingyu Liu, Haikun Wang, Yang Liu, Jinnan Wang, Matti Jantunen, Jun Bi, Patrick L. Kinney
Institution:
Nanjing University, Emory University, Chinese Academy for Environmental Planning, Finland National Institute for Health and Welfare, Columbia University