Dept. of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA.
Water Sci Technol. 2012;66(3):644-52. doi: 10.2166/wst.2012.144.
This paper analyzes the influence of wastewater treatment access of a region and the effect on public health improvement independent of its economy. The sample set is derived from 39 different nations. The study employs health, economic and environmental indicators such as gross national income, human development index; disease mortality due to diarrheal diseases, tuberculosis and malaria, access to sanitation, wastewater treatment and collection. It is necessary to extricate the impact of increased wastewater treatment access on disease mortality from that of increased national income and health care. Hence we observed this influence for very small ranges of human development. It was concluded that an increase in wastewater treatment availability reduces disease mortality, independent of an increase in income or sanitation. Trends in the lack of wastewater treatment with the logarithm of disease mortality had correlation coefficients (r(2)) of 0.35-0.5 at a high significance (P < 0.001). Previous studies have emphasized the relation between improved sanitation and public health. This study reasserts the necessity for wastewater treatment in order to mitigate disease burden and mortality.
本文分析了一个地区的污水处理接入情况及其对公共卫生改善的影响，而不考虑其经济因素。样本集来自 39 个不同的国家。该研究采用了健康、经济和环境指标，如国民总收入、人类发展指数;腹泻病、结核病和疟疾导致的疾病死亡率、环境卫生、污水处理和收集情况。有必要将污水处理的增加对疾病死亡率的影响，从国民收入和医疗保健的增加中分离出来。因此，我们观察到在人类发展的非常小的范围内，这种影响是存在的。研究结果表明，增加污水处理的供应可以降低疾病死亡率，而与收入或环境卫生的提高无关。缺乏污水处理与疾病死亡率的对数之间的趋势具有高度显著性（P<0.001）的相关系数（r(2)）为 0.35-0.5。以前的研究强调了改善卫生条件与公共卫生之间的关系。本研究再次强调了进行污水处理的必要性，以减轻疾病负担和死亡率。
