Has reducing fine particulate matter and ozone caused reduced mortality rates in the United States?

Cox, Louis Anthony; Popken, Douglas A.

doi:10.1016/j.annepidem.2014.11.006

Cited by 44 publications

(33 citation statements)

References 44 publications

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“…The causality of the adverse effects of air pollution on human health is yet to be established. 58 However, the same study revealed that the ∼30% decreases of PM 2.5 and O 3 levels achieved in that period, thanks to the implementation of more stringent emission controls, did not translate into statistically significant changes in premature mortality rates. This is an important finding that begets the question of how stringent future regulations on air quality should be in order to achieve tangible improvements.…”

Section: Chemistry On the Surface Of The Human Lung Is Unusually Selementioning

confidence: 94%

Detecting Intermediates and Products of Fast Heterogeneous Reactions on Liquid Surfaces via Online Mass Spectrometry

Colussi¹,

Enami²

2018

Preprint

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One of the research priorities in atmospheric chemistry is to advance our understanding of heterogeneous reactions and their effect on the composition of the troposphere. Chemistry on aqueous surfaces is particularly important in this regard because of their ubiquity and expanse. They range from the surfaces of oceans (360 million km2), cloud and aerosol drops (~10 trillion km2) to the fluids lining the human lung (~200 m2). Typically, ambient air contains reactive gases that may affect human health, influence climate and participate in biogeochemical cycles. Despite their importance, reactions between gases and solutes at air-aqueous interfaces are not well understood. New, surface-specific techniques are required that detect and identify the intermediates and products of such reactions as they happen on liquids. This is a tall order because genuine interfacial reactions are faster than mass diffusion into bulk liquids, and may produce novel species at low concentrations. Herein, we review evidence that validates online pneumatic ionization mass spectrometry of liquid microjets dosed by reactive gases as a technique meeting such requirements. Next, we call attention to results obtained by this approach on reactions of ozone, nitrogen dioxide and hydroxyl radicals with various solutes on aqueous surfaces. The overarching conclusion is that the outermost layers of aqueous solutions are unique media, where equilibria shift and reactions proceed faster than, in some cases along different pathways from the bulk liquids. The fact that the rates and mechanisms of reactions at air-aqueous interfaces may not be deduced from experiments in bulk liquids opens new conceptual frameworks and lines of research, and adds an overlooked dimension to atmospheric chemistry.

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Section: Chemistry On the Surface Of The Human Lung Is Unusually Selementioning

confidence: 94%

Detecting Intermediates and Products of Fast Heterogeneous Reactions on Liquid Surfaces via Online Mass Spectrometry

Colussi¹,

Enami²

2018

Preprint

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“…Further, they highlight the importance of having a control population with comparable health experiences during the study period that was also not affected by the intervention and its reduced air pollutant concentrations to assess if any residual confounding remains. As discussed by Cox and Popken (2015), 23 the lack of an adequate control group that experienced the same trends in mortality (here a decline in cardiovascular and total mortality over the past several years), but not the improvements in air quality, makes any conclusion about the impact of an intervention on mortality (here total or cardiovascular mortality) less convincing.…”

Section: Residential Heating Fuel and Change In Heating Fuel Typementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Further, new and previously developed causal inference methods have been proposed for such accountability studies. 23,74 …”

Section: Conclusion and Lessons Learnedmentioning

confidence: 99%

Accountability studies of air pollution and health effects: lessons learned and recommendations for future natural experiment opportunities

Rich

2017

Environment International

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To address limitations of observational epidemiology studies of air pollution and health effects, including residual confounding by temporal and spatial factors, several studies have taken advantage of ‘natural experiments’, where an environmental policy or air quality intervention has resulted in reductions in ambient air pollution concentrations. Researchers have examined whether the population impacted by these air quality improvements, also experienced improvements in various health indices (e.g. reduced morbidity/mortality). In this paper, I review key accountability studies done previously and new studies done over the past several years in Beijing, Atlanta, London, Ireland, and other locations, describing study design and analysis strengths and limitations of each. As new ‘natural experiment’ opportunities arise, several lessons learned from these studies should be applied when planning a new accountability study. Comparison of health outcomes during the intervention to both before and after the intervention in the population of interest, as well as use of a control population to assess whether any temporal changes in the population of interest were also seen in populations not impacted by air quality improvements, should aid in minimizing residual confounding by these long term time trends. Use of either detailed health records for a population, or prospectively collected data on relevant mechanistic biomarkers coupled with such morbidity/mortality data may provide a more thorough assessment of if the intervention beneficially impacted the health of the community, and if so by what mechanism(s). Further, prospective measurement of a large suite of air pollutants may allow a more thorough understanding of what pollutant source(s) is/are responsible for any health benefit observed. The importance of using multiple statistical analysis methods in each paper and the difference in how the timing of the air pollution/outcome association may impact which of these design features is most important is also discussed. Based on these and other lessons learned, researchers may provide a more epidemiologically rigorous evaluation of cause-specific health impacts of an air quality intervention or action.

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“…For example, [76] identified a Grangercausal association between fatty diet and risk of heart disease decades later in aggregate (national level) data. Cox and Popken [16] found a statistically significant historical association, but no evidence of Granger causation, between ozone exposures and elderly mortality rates on a time scale of years. Granger causality testing software is freely available in R (e.g., http://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/ MSBVAR/MSBVAR.pdf).…”

Section: Granger Causality Tests Show Whether Changes In Hypothesizedmentioning

confidence: 97%

Quantifying and Reducing Uncertainty about Causality in Improving Public Health and Safety

Cox¹

2015

Handbook of Uncertainty Quantification

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Has reducing fine particulate matter and ozone caused reduced mortality rates in the United States?

Cited by 44 publications

References 44 publications

Detecting Intermediates and Products of Fast Heterogeneous Reactions on Liquid Surfaces via Online Mass Spectrometry

Detecting Intermediates and Products of Fast Heterogeneous Reactions on Liquid Surfaces via Online Mass Spectrometry

Accountability studies of air pollution and health effects: lessons learned and recommendations for future natural experiment opportunities

Quantifying and Reducing Uncertainty about Causality in Improving Public Health and Safety

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