A Novel Strategy for the Assessment of Radon Risk Based on Indicators.

Simona Mancini,Michele Guida,Martins Vilnitis

doi:10.3390/ijerph18158089

Abstract

Among the physical pollutants affecting indoor air, the radioactive gas radon may turn out to be the most hazardous. Health effects related to radon exposure have been investigated for several decades, providing major scientific evidence to conclude that chronic exposures can cause lung cancer. Additionally, an association with other diseases, such as leukemia and cancers of the extra-thoracic airways, has been advanced. The implementation of a strategy to reduce the exposure of the population and minimize the health risk, according to the European Directive 59/2013/Euratom on ionizing radiations, is a new challenge in public health management. Starting from an understanding of the general state-of-the-art, a critical analysis of existing approaches has been conducted, identifying strengths and weaknesses. Then, a strategy for assessing the radon exposure of the general population, in a new comprehensive way, is proposed. It identifies three main areas of intervention and provides a list of hazard indicators and operative solutions to control human exposure. The strategy has been conceived to provide a supporting tool to authorities in the introduction of effective measures to assess population health risks due to radon exposure.

Highlights

Air pollution causes serious harm to human health [1]
The proposed approach is based on the definition of control indicators for each potential source of the hazard, ranked in classes according to the severity of the impact. This preliminary proposal aims to constitute the basis for the future development of a health risk model (HRM) based on the calculation of an exposure score (ES), able to determine and predict the global exposure of the population to indoor radon [9]
The development of methodologies for early warning analysis, control of the risk, and optimization of the solutions is an important task in the management of every issue

Summary

Introduction

Air pollution causes serious harm to human health [1]. Many epidemiological studies, over the decades, have demonstrated how human health can be strongly influenced by environmental factors, including exposure to physical, chemical, biological, and radiological contaminants in the environment. HRA in indoor air principally pays attention to chemical and biological agents or ergonomics, lighting, and microclimate factors, since they more frequently affect closed environments, often neglecting one of the most hazardous physical agents: the carcinogenic naturally occurring radioactive gas radon (222Rn) [3,4]. It is well established, that there is a clear connection between indoor exposure, by inhalation, to radon and the incidence of lung cancer [3]. This preliminary proposal aims to constitute the basis for the future development of a health risk model (HRM) based on the calculation of an exposure score (ES), able to determine and predict the global exposure of the population to indoor radon [9]

The Framework

The Method

Results and Discussion

Conclusions