Human health impact and economic effect for PM2.5 exposure in typical cities

Cities have been suffering from severe air pollution for decades due to intensive energy related production and consumption activities. Exposure to hazardous PM2.5 would not only trigger human health impact, but also result in an economic loss for both society and individual. In this study, the PM2.5-related health impact and corresponding economic loss are assessed in typical cities from north part of China. In these cities, huge amount of energy is consumed for space heating during the cold days, which has been proven to be the major contributor to PM2.5 emissions. Considering the remarkable difference of space heating utilization and average PM2.5 concentration, the study examines the health and welfare impact of PM2.5 exposure in both winter season and summer season from 2013 to 2016. Adjusted human capital method and the cost of illness are applied to assess the economic loss of premature death and medical expenses on PM2.5-related diseases, respectively. Welfare loss is proposed to quantify the financial damages caused by PM2.5 to the individual, which is calculated based on the proportion of health care expenses in disposable personal income. The results show that the number of cases for PM2.5-related mortality and morbidity during the winter season is about three times as much as that in summer season in 28 cities. If the annual average PM2.5 concentration has decreased from the current polluted condition to 35 mu g/m(3) (national health standard), about 16.46 billion Yuan, 0.54% of gross domestic product in 28 cities can be saved annually during the study period. The welfare loss in cities of provincial capital is obviously higher than other cities from the same province, which is associated with the higher consumption level and living quality of capital cities. Moreover, patients requiring hospital admission from rural household are more likely to be impoverished than that from urban household, which aggravates the economic burden of rural residents to recover from the suffer of PM2.5-related diseases. Estimation of the health impact and economic losses for the society and individual represent an integral part of a full analysis of the consequences of PM2.5 exposure to human beings, which can provide some insightful observations for policy makers to keep the social equality, welfare and environment conservation.