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An estimate of excess mortality resulting from air pollution caused by wildfires in the eastern and central Mediterranean basin in 2021
  • Bin Zhou,
  • Christoph Knote
Bin Zhou
University of Augsburg

Corresponding Author:[email protected]

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Christoph Knote
University of Augsburg
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Abstract

Wildfires result in human fatalities not only due to the direct exposure to flames, but also indirectly through smoke inhalation. The Mediterranean basin with its hot and dry summers is a hotspot for such devastating events. The situation has further been aggravated in recent years by climate change as well as a growing and aging population in the region. To assess the health impacts due to short-term exposure to air pollution created by the 2021 summer wildfires in the eastern and central Mediterranean basin, we used a regional-scale chemistry transport model to simulate concentrations of major air pollutants such as fine particulate matter with a diameter less than 2.5 μm (PM2.5), SO2, NO2, and O3 - in a fire and a no-fire scenario. Elevated short-term exposure of the population to air pollutants are associated with excess all-cause mortality using relative risks for individual pollutants from previously published meta-analyses. Our estimates indicate that the short-term exposure to wildfire-caused changes in O3 accounted for 741 (95% CI:556-940) excess deaths in total over the entire region of investigation during the wildfire season between mid-July to early October 2021. This is followed by 270 (95% CI:177-370) excess deaths due to elevated PM2.5 exposure, rendering the health effect of increased O3 from wildfires larger than the effect of increased PM2.5. We show this to be attributed largely to the spatially more widespread impact of wildfires on O3. Our study concludes with a discussion on uncertainties associated with the health impact assessment based on different air pollutants.