The effect of clean air on pharmaceutical expenditures

Alexander Rohlf, Felix Holub, Nicolas Koch and Nolan Ritter

Economics Letters, 2020, vol. 192, issue C

Abstract: Airborne emissions are detrimental to health. Low emission zones (LEZs) that restrict pollution-intensive vehicles from entering are popular measures to curb local emissions such as particulate matter. We evaluate how LEZs impact defensive pharmaceutical expenditures. To this end, we use the complete medical histories of 2.7M individuals insured with Germany’s largest public health insurer AOK. We identify causal effects exploiting the quasi-experimental, staggered introduction of LEZs in 49 cities. We find that LEZs reduce annual pharmaceutical expenditures for heart and respiratory diseases by 15.8M€, representing a significant fraction of policy costs.

Keywords: Air pollution; Driving ban; Quasi-experiment; Pharmaceutical expenditures; Health (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I18 Q52 Q53 Q58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (12)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:ecolet:v:192:y:2020:i:c:s0165176520301580

DOI: 10.1016/j.econlet.2020.109221

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