Air quality assessment and its relation topotential health impacts in Delhi, India

UTKARSH YADAV

Relevance and Scope

Over the last few decades, several studies have been undertaken in various parts of the world to prove the relationship between air quality and health Few studies have been conducted for the Asian regionAccording to World Health Organization (WHO)10, urban air pollution is responsible for approximately 800,000 deaths and 4.6 million lost life-years annually around the globeThe problem of air pollution has assumed serious proportions in Delhi, which is also reflected by an increase in the respiratory and cardiovascular mortality11

A report published by the Directorate of Economics and Statistics, Government of National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi (New Delhi, India) found a higher percentage of certified death (24.9% in 2012 compared to 16.4% in 2009) due to disease of respiratory and circulatory system both of which are believed to have direct linkages with air pollution.

SCOPE

Evidence from different studies has shown that respiratory and cardiopulmonary disease is strongly associated with air qualityDelhi is considered among the most polluted megacities of the world19 and offers a first-hand choice to study air pollution problems.air quality report published by the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), Government of India (GoI) reported that Delhi has exceeded the annual average reparable particulate matter (RSPM) concentration limit by more than four times the national annual standards

The city itself accounts for about 8% of the totalregistered motor vehicles in India, which is more than three other metropolitan citiesThe annual report on registration of births and deaths in Delhialso shows an increasing trend in respiratory mortality in certified deaths for the period 2006-2014

Literature review Guideline document. World Health Organization, 2000. (a study which

talked about Evaluation and use of epidemiological evidence for environmental health risk assessment)

Modeling the association between particle constituents of air pollution and health outcomes. 2012 paper by Mostofsky, E., Schwartz, J., Coull

Health Care Manage paper by Jayaraman, G(Air pollution and associated respiratory morbidity in Delhi.)

Journal of Environmental & Resource Economics by Kumar, S and D N Rao (2001),(Valuing Benefits of Air Pollution Abatement Using Health Production Function)

Discussion Paper no. 62/2003, Delhi:Institute of Economic Growth, IEG Website.by Murty, M N, S C Gulati and A Banerjee (2003),(Health Benefits from Urban Air Pollution Abatement in the Indian Subcontinent,”)

Air Pollution and Respiratory diseases by Varadarajan, D B and V Subramanian (1993)

Main Points Assessment of the quality of air has been done

studying various pollutants A comparative study has been done considering

different cities and abroad also Also seasonal variations of pollutants has been

studied considering variety of seasons India has A deep study of health ailments occurring from

bad quality air and its association Increase in the mortality rate and no. of patients

with respiratory ailments in opd wards of major hospitals.

OBJECTIVE -To interpret air quality through Air Quality Index(AQI) and understand health impacts of air pollutant concentration levels monitored .-To estimate benefit and cost of air pollution abatement

in Delhi usinga)Household health production functionb)Demand function

HYPOTHESIS According to the AQI system air quality is associated

with mortality and respiratory morbidity rate of Delhi,

Methodology(Air Quality index)

Daily averaged concentration data of air pollutants were interpreted into AQI values for different air quality Monitoring stations for the period 2006–2014 based on the US EPA method

Air quality monitoring stations were compared based on yearly percentage trend in each of the health categories

Higher AQI value denotes poor air quality and an increasingly large percentage of the population is likelyto experience increasingly severe adverse health effects

To study the strength of association of AQI values on mortality rate, weighting factor (e.g. 1 for AQI category ‘Good’, 2 for ‘Moderate’, 3 for ‘Unhealthy for sensitive groups’, 4 for ‘Unhealthy’, 5 for ‘Very unhealthy’, 6 for ‘hazardous’, and 7 for ‘most hazardous’) was used for aggregating the frequency percentage of different AQI classes. The weighted aggregated AQI (WAAQI) values were correlated with all non-trauma mortality rate and respiratory morbidity rate to study the association of AQI with health implications.AQI formula

Household health production function & Demand function

HHPF is a function that measures the health benefits of reduced air pollution by directly using the willingness to pay information through valuation methods. Depends on no. of work days lost.

Demand function is another part of individuals utility function where the expenditure on all the mitigating activities is minimized and is measured by no. of days of sickness

Equations

Dependent variablesa)Work Lost Days (H): H represents the number

of workdays lost per person per week due to diseases / symptoms associated with air pollution

b)Mitigating Activities (M): Mitigating activities (M) include expenses incurred as a result of air pollution related diseases. These expenditures include costs of medicines, doctor’s fees, diagnostic tests, hospitalization, travel to doctor’s clinic, etc., per person, per week.

independent variables a) Respirable Particulate Matter (PM10,)b) Nitrogen Oxides (NOx)c) Sulphur Dioxide (SO2)

variation of air quality index (AQI) frequency at different air quality monitoring stations

Season-wise percentage distribution of poor air quality in Delhi

Correlation analysis between all mortality rate (per lakh population) and air quality index

Working data

Results :household health production function

Results :demand function

Preliminary results:Air Quality Index

significant relationship of AQI values with mortality rate as well as respiratory morbidity rate.

air quality in Delhi shows a gradual deterioration in with respect to the AQI values from 2005 onwards

Statistical analysis shows a significant association of the AQI values in relation to the all non-trauma mortality rate (r = 0.877, P < 0.01) and respiratory morbidity rate

Household health production function

Positive coefficients of all pollution parameters indicate an increase in workdays lost as pollution level increases

Also there is a decrease in the work days lost during clear and hot weeks

People suffering from chronic diseases are more susceptible to air pollution exposure there more work days lost

Demand function The coefficients of pollution parameters

show there is an increase in the mitigating activities (medical expenditure) with the increase in the pollutants levels

Temperature coefficients show the mitigating expenses reduces on sunny and hot days.

SOURCES National Ambient Air Quality Monitoring Program

me of Delhi Directorate of Economics and Statistics,

Government of National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi(website)

Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), (website) Delhi Statistical Handbook21 and ‘Report on medical certification of cause of deaths in Delhi’ Department of meteorology website Guideline document. World Health Organization,

2000.

THANK YOU