Long-term effects of air pollutants on deaths in a semi-urban city in Northwestern Turkey: a time series analysis

ABSTRACT

To examine the associations between daily variations of coarse Particulate Matter(PM₁₀) and/or sulfur dioxide(SO₂) and mortality. The Poisson Generalized Linear Model(GLM) was employed to analyze the relationship between ambient air pollutants such as PM₁₀ and SO₂ and mortality. For each 10 μg/m³ increase in PM₁₀, the overall mortality risk was found to be 1.022-fold high on the previous-eighth-day(lag 7) (RR, 95%CI:1.002–1.042) in the unadjusted model; 1.031-fold high in men (RR, 95%CI:1.005–1.058); 1.024-fold high in those aged 65 and over (RR, 95%CI:1.001–1.048). Also, the risk of death in men was 1.028-fold high in the model adjusted on the previous- eighth-day(lag 7) (RR, 95%CI:1.002–1.055). Mortality risk was found to be 1.088-fold high in 10 μg/m³ increase in SO₂ under 65 years in males in the previous-third-day(lag 2) in the unadjusted model, and the risk of death was found to be 1.086-fold (RR, 95%CI:1.007–1.164) high in males in the adjusted model.   

KEYWORDS:

• Particular matter
• sulfur dioxide
• death
• generalized linear model
• time-series analysis

Key points

• Total deaths are associated with PM10 exposure.

• Male deaths and deaths at and over the age of 65 are associated with PM10 exposure.

• Male deaths and deaths below the age of 65 are associated with SO₂ exposure.

Acknowledgements

This article was based on the master thesis and was presented as an oral presentation in Turkey in 2020, and its summary text was published in the proceedings book. The authors would like to acknowledge Yilmaz Mercan (MSc) for their valuable insights into the design and application of the graphics of this work.

Author contributions

Conceptualization: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Data curation: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Formal Analysis: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Investigation: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Methodology: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Resources: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Supervision: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Validation: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Visualization: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Writing – Original draft: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan; Writing – Review & Editing: Hamza Demirbilek, Yeliz Mercan.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Compliance with ethical standards

To conduct this retrospective research, ethics approval was obtained from the Ethics Committee of the Institute of Health Sciences at Kirklareli University (21/06/2019-P0153R00).

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Additional information

Funding

The author(s) reported there is no funding associated with the work featured in this article.