Abstract
In January 2013, severe haze events over northeastern China sparked substantial health concerns. This study explores the associations of fine particulate matter less than 2.5 μm (PM2.5) and black carbon (BC) with hospital emergency room visits (ERVs) during a haze season in Beijing. During that period, daily counts of ERVs for respiratory, cardiovascular and ocular diseases were obtained from a Level-3A hospital in Beijing from 1 December 2012 to 28 February 2013, and associations of which with PM2.5 and BC were estimated by time-stratified case-crossover analysis in single- and two-pollutant models. We found a 27.5% (95% confidence interval (CI): 13.0, 43.9%) increase in respiratory ERV (lag02), a 19.4% (95% CI: 2.5, 39.0%) increase in cardiovascular ERV (lag0), and a 12.6% (95% CI: 0.0, 26.7%) increase in ocular ERV (lag0) along with an interquartile range (IQR) increase in the PM2.5. An IQR increase of BC was associated with 27.6% (95% CI: 9.6, 48.6%) (lag02), 18.8% (95% CI: 1.4, 39.2%) (lag0) and 11.8% (95% CI: −1.4, 26.8%) (lag0) increases for changes in these same health outcomes respectively. Estimated associations were consistent after adjusting SO2 or NO2 in two-pollutant models. This study provides evidence that improving air quality and reducing haze days would greatly benefit the population health.
Highlights
Beijing, the capital of China, experienced several severe haze episodes in January 2013 that focused attention on the issues of poor air quality
When examining effect modification by gender (Figure 5), we found that associations between elevated PM2.5 and black carbon (BC) concentrations and increments of respiratory and ocular emergency room visits (ERVs) were larger in females, whereas that was larger in males between PM2.5 and cardiovascular ERVs, though all these differences are not statistically significant
Though no evidence was found for BC and the morbidity of ocular diseases previously, our study indicated that BC had a significant association with ocular disorders ERVs during highly polluted days, after adjusting NO2 concentrations
Summary
The capital of China, experienced several severe haze episodes in January 2013 that focused attention on the issues of poor air quality. There has been a growing concern in this region that poor air quality is affecting both human health and the environment. Haze events mainly occur during winter months due to stable meteorological conditions and emissions from coal-fired power plants and residential heating [1,2]. Among the constituents of urban haze are aerosols. The fine particle fraction of these aerosols is known as PM2.5 (particles less than 2.5 μm in aerodynamic diameter), which is one of the main pollutants in haze [3]. The annual mean concentration of ambient PM2.5 in Beijing was
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