Research

Health impact assessment of particulate pollution in Tallinn using fine spatial resolution and modeling techniques

Hans Orru^1,2 , Erik Teinemaa³ , Taavi Lai¹ , Tanel Tamm⁴ , Marko Kaasik⁵ , Veljo Kimmel⁶ , Kati Kangur⁷ , Eda Merisalu¹ and Bertil Forsberg²

¹  Department of Public Health, University of Tartu, Ravila 19, Tartu 50411, Estonia

²  Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine, Umea University, Umea SE-901 87, Sweden

³  Estonian Environmental Research Centre, Marja 4d, Tallinn 10617, Estonia

⁴  Department of Physics, University of Tartu, Riia 142, Tartu 50414, Estonia

⁵  Department of Ecology and Geography, University of Tartu, Vanemuise 46, Tartu 50414, Estonia

⁶  Institute of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences, Estonian University of Life Sciences, Kreutzwaldi 64, Tartu 51014, Estonia

⁷  Department of Geography, King's College London, Strand, London ,WC2R 2LS, UK

author email corresponding author email

Environmental Health 2009, 8:7doi:10.1186/1476-069X-8-7

Published:	3 March 2009

Abstract

Background

Health impact assessments (HIA) use information on exposure, baseline mortality/morbidity and exposure-response functions from epidemiological studies in order to quantify the health impacts of existing situations and/or alternative scenarios. The aim of this study was to improve HIA methods for air pollution studies in situations where exposures can be estimated using GIS with high spatial resolution and dispersion modeling approaches.

Methods

Tallinn was divided into 84 sections according to neighborhoods, with a total population of approx. 390 000 persons. Actual baseline rates for total mortality and hospitalization with cardiovascular and respiratory diagnosis were identified. The exposure to fine particles (PM_2.5) from local emissions was defined as the modeled annual levels. The model validation and morbidity assessment were based on 2006 PM₁₀ or PM_2.5 levels at 3 monitoring stations. The exposure-response coefficients used were for total mortality 6.2% (95% CI 1.6–11%) per 10 μg/m³ increase of annual mean PM_2.5 concentration and for the assessment of respiratory and cardiovascular hospitalizations 1.14% (95% CI 0.62–1.67%) and 0.73% (95% CI 0.47–0.93%) per 10 μg/m³ increase of PM₁₀. The direct costs related to morbidity were calculated according to hospital treatment expenses in 2005 and the cost of premature deaths using the concept of Value of Life Year (VOLY).

Results

The annual population-weighted-modeled exposure to locally emitted PM_2.5 in Tallinn was 11.6 μg/m³. Our analysis showed that it corresponds to 296 (95% CI 76528) premature deaths resulting in 3859 (95% CI 10236636) Years of Life Lost (YLL) per year. The average decrease in life-expectancy at birth per resident of Tallinn was estimated to be 0.64 (95% CI 0.17–1.10) years. While in the polluted city centre this may reach 1.17 years, in the least polluted neighborhoods it remains between 0.1 and 0.3 years. When dividing the YLL by the number of premature deaths, the decrease in life expectancy among the actual cases is around 13 years. As for the morbidity, the short-term effects of air pollution were estimated to result in an additional 71 (95% CI 43–104) respiratory and 204 (95% CI 131–260) cardiovascular hospitalizations per year. The biggest external costs are related to the long-term effects on mortality: this is on average €150 (95% CI 40–260) million annually. In comparison, the costs of short-term air-pollution driven hospitalizations are small €0.3 (95% CI 0.2–0.4) million.

Conclusion

Sectioning the city for analysis and using GIS systems can help to improve the accuracy of air pollution health impact estimations, especially in study areas with poor air pollution monitoring data but available dispersion models.