The Relationship Between Air Pollution and All-Cause Mortality in Singapore

Abstract

Ambient air pollution is a risk factor for both acute and chronic diseases and poses serious health threats to the world population. We aim to study the relationship between air pollution and all-cause mortality in the context of a city-state exposed to the Southeast Asian haze problem. The primary exposure was ambient air pollution, as measured by the Pollutants Standards Index (PSI). The outcome of interest was all-cause mortality from 2010–2015. A time-stratified case-crossover design was performed. A conditional Poisson regression model, including environmental variables such as PSI, temperature, wind speed, and rainfall, was fitted to the daily count of deaths to estimate the incidence rate ratio (IRR) of mortality per unit increase in PSI, accounting for overdispersion and autocorrelation. To account for intermediate exposure effects (maximum lag of 10 days), a distributed lag non-linear model was used. There were 105,504 deaths during the study period. Increment in PSI was significantly associated with an increased risk of mortality. The adjusted IRR of mortality per the 10-unit increase in PSI was 1.01 (95%CI = 1.00–1.01). The lag effect was stronger when PSI was in the unhealthy range compared to the good and moderate ranges. At lag = 7 days, PSI appeared to have an adverse effect on mortality, although the effect was not significant. These findings provide evidence on the general health hazard of exposure to air pollution and can potentially guide public health policies in the region.

Air-Pollution Control in an Emergent Market: Does It Work? Evidence from Romania

“…The results of a study by Kunzli et al [15] showed that, in European countries like Austria, France, and Switzerland, air pollution is the cause of death of more than 40,000 people. As well, previous studies in Southeast Asia demonstrated a significant association between an increase in mortality and Pollutants Standards Index [16][17][18][19][20]. Likewise, trends in low birth weight, neonatal deaths, fetal and infant mortality, spontaneous abortion, and the occurrence of birth defects were found to correspond closely with quantities of outdoor pollution [21][22][23][24][25].…”

Leveraging Machine Learning Techniques and Engineering of Multi-Nature Features for National Daily Regional Ambulance Demand Prediction

“…Furthermore, our solution is a preliminary take on this problem in Singapore, and it predicts the demands only under certain typical conditions. Although there are peaks and troughs in demands every now and then, these values are in no way near the extremes that happen during very large-scale incidents, e.g., epidemics, haze [33][34][35], and diurnal temperature changes. A potential area of improvement is to make use of historical data to model the demand at such extreme cases of large-scale incidents.…”

A scoping review on the health effects of smoke haze from vegetation and peatland fires in Southeast Asia: Issues with study approaches and interpretation

“…Among the 70 studies, 42, 11, and 15 were EPI, HBE and HRA studies, respectively; two were both EPI and HBE. Forty-nine studies were conducted in the maritime area (Indonesia [ 41 , 44 – 57 ], Malaysia [ 29 , 58 – 68 ], Singapore [ 69 – 82 ], Brunei [ 83 , 84 ], multiple countries in maritime area [ 40 , 85 – 89 ]), 17 in the mainland area (Thailand [ 32 , 90 – 104 ], multiple countries in mainland area [ 105 ]); and 4 in multiple countries in the entire Southeast Asia [ 19 , 106 – 108 ] ( Fig 2 ). The breakdown of studies by country is as follows: 41 EPI [ 32 , 44 – 46 , 49 – 58 , 61 – 67 , 69 , 70 , 75 – 84 , 90 , 97 – 103 ], three HBE [ 41 , 47 , 104 ], and 15 HRA [ 29 , 48 , 59 , 60 , 68 , 71 – 74 , 91 – 96 ] studies were conducted in a single country (Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, and Thailand); whereas one EPI study [ 85 ], eight HBE […”