Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic has imposed a unique situation for humanity, reaching up to 5623 deaths in Sao Paulo city during the analyzed period of this study. Due to the measures for social distancing, an improvement of air quality was observed worldwide. In view of this scenario, we investigated the air quality improvement related to PM10, PM2.5, and NO2 concentrations during 90 days of quarantine compared to an equivalent period in 2019. We found a significant drop in air pollution of 45% of PM10, 46% of PM2.5, and 58% of NO2, and using a relative-risk function, we estimated that this significant air quality improvement avoided, respectively, 78, 337, and 387 premature deaths, respectively, and prevented approximately US $720 million on health costs. Moreover, we estimated that 5623 deaths by COVID-19 represent an economic health loss of US $10.5 billion. Both health and economic gains associated with air pollution reductions give a positive perspective of the efforts towards keeping air pollution reduced even after the pandemic, highlighting the importance of improving the strategies of air pollution mitigation actions, as well as the crucial role of adopting efficient measures to protect human health both during and after the COVID-19 global health crisis.
Highlights
The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic caused by rapidly spreading a severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has imposed a unique situation for humanity since the Spanish flu pandemic, transmitted by the H1N1 influenza A virus, which devastated at least 50 million people in 1918
We estimated the economic health loss associated with deaths related to COVID-19 in Sao Paulo city, which was exceedingly raised, even before reaching the important goal of flattening the curve of coronavirus infections, which makes us wonder about the efficiency of the applied public policies and the commitment of the strategies of controlling the pandemic and population’s commitment to comply with social distancing
Anjum (2020) showed, from satellite images, a remarkable reduction of air pollution in Italy, France, and the USA [67]. Our results corroborate these findings since we showed a significant reduction in NO2 concentration in Sao Paulo city, which was greater than the other analyzed pollutants, confirmed by the abrupt decline of 62.8% in tropospheric NO2 concentrations observed by satellite images
Summary
The coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic caused by rapidly spreading a severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has imposed a unique situation for humanity since the Spanish flu pandemic, transmitted by the H1N1 influenza A virus, which devastated at least 50 million people in 1918. SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV can cause severe respiratory distress syndrome in humans, and despite SARS-CoV-2 being highly pathogenic and deadlier to humans, SARS epidemics (2003–2004) and MERS outbreaks (2012) were responsible for the deaths of thousands of people worldwide, as shown in Figure 1 [1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8]. Ry 2020 in Sao Paulo city, Brazil. ItIhn aadddiitaimone,tear relecsesntthcaanse 2s.t5udmyicrreopnosrte(PdMth2.e5),st5ro,0n1g2 premature deaths occur per year in Sao Paulo city [27].
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