Health Risk and Resilience Assessment with Respect to the Main Air Pollutants in Sichuan

Junnan Xiong, Chongchong Ye, Tiancai Zhou and Weiming Cheng
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Junnan Xiong: School of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Southwest Petroleum University, Chengdu 610500, China
Chongchong Ye: School of Civil Engineering and Architecture, Southwest Petroleum University, Chengdu 610500, China
Tiancai Zhou: Synthesis Research Centre of Chinese Ecosystem Research Network, Key Laboratory of Ecosystem Network Observation and Modelling, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100101, China
Weiming Cheng: State Key Laboratory of Resources and Environmental Information System, Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, CAS, Beijing 100101, China

IJERPH, 2019, vol. 16, issue 15, 1-19

Abstract: Rapid urbanization and industrialization in developing countries have caused an increase in air pollutant concentrations, and this has attracted public concern due to the resulting harmful effects to health. Here we present, through the spatial-temporal characteristics of six criteria air pollutants (PM 2.5 , PM 10 , SO 2 , NO 2 , CO, and O 3 ) in Sichuan, a human health risk assessment framework conducted to evaluate the health risk of different age groups caused by ambient air pollutants. Public health resilience was evaluated with respect to the risk resulting from ambient air pollutants, and a spatial inequality analysis between the risk caused by ambient air pollutants and hospital density in Sichuan was performed based on the Lorenz curve and Gini coefficient. The results indicated that high concentrations of PM 2.5 (47.7 μg m −3 ) and PM 10 (75.9 μg m −3 ) were observed in the Sichuan Basin; these two air pollutants posed a high risk to infants. The high risk caused by PM 2.5 was mainly distributed in Sichuan Basin (1.14) and that caused by PM 10 was principally distributed in Zigong (1.01). Additionally, the infants in Aba and Ganzi had high health resilience to the risk caused by PM 2.5 (3.89 and 4.79, respectively) and PM 10 (3.28 and 2.77, respectively), which was explained by the low risk in these two regions. These regions and Sichuan had severe spatial inequality between the infant hazard quotient caused by PM 2.5 ( G = 0.518, G = 0.493, and G = 0.456, respectively) and hospital density. This spatial inequality was also caused by PM 10 ( G = 0.525, G = 0.526, and G = 0.466, respectively), which is mainly attributed to the imbalance between hospital distribution and risk caused by PM 2.5 (PM 10 ) in these two areas. Such research could provide a basis for the formulation of medical construction and future air pollution control measures in Sichuan.

Keywords: air pollutants; health risk assessment; health resilience assessment; spatial inequality analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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