Chiang Yi-Chen, Li Xian, Lee Chun-Yang, Rui Jia, Hu Chiung-Wen, Yang Hao-Jan, Chen Szu-Chieh, Chen Tianmu, Su Yanhua, Kuo Chung-Yih, Hsueh Shao-Chieh
State Key Laboratory of Molecular Vaccinology and Molecular Diagnostics, School of Public Health, Xiamen University, Xiamen, Fujian People's Republic of China.
School of International Business, Xiamen University Tan Kah Kee College, Zhangzhou, Fujian People's Republic of China.
Air Qual Atmos Health. 2021;14(3):371-380. doi: 10.1007/s11869-020-00942-3. Epub 2020 Sep 18.
In recent years, children living in the downstream of the Choshui River in Taiwan have been exposed to violent dust episodes. For the sake of the health of these children, we aimed to investigate the effectiveness of protective equipment (sand-proof plastic cover and air purifier) installed outside/inside the classrooms on students' pulmonary function and evaluate the health education program for preventing the adverse consequences of exposure to river-dust episodes. Public elementary school students in Yunlin County, which was severely affected by river-dust, were selected as the participants. Study 1 consisted of three-wave follow-up data (801 person-times) in high-/low-dust exposure regions to examine pulmonary function. Study 2 used 147 and 73 students in the high-/low-dust exposure regions, respectively, to establish our health education intervention. Paired tests, repeated measures ANOVA, and generalized estimating equation were used to analyze the short- and long-term effects. The results showed that the students' pulmonary function in schools that installed protective equipment was improved. The health education (such as the usage of correct masks and our designed PM full-cover sand-proof clothing) improved the students' cognition and behaviors related to river-dust episodes and yielded both short- and long-term effects. Therefore, we suggest more schools with high-dust exposure to adopt protective equipment and health education program. Our designed PM full-cover sand-proof clothing can prevent from not only haze but also droplet transmission by infectious diseases such as COVID-19.
近年来，台湾浊水溪下游地区的儿童一直暴露于剧烈的沙尘事件中。为了这些儿童的健康，我们旨在调查安装在教室外/内的防护设备（防沙塑料罩和空气净化器）对学生肺功能的有效性，并评估预防暴露于河流沙尘事件不良后果的健康教育计划。选择受河流沙尘严重影响的云林县公立小学学生作为参与者。研究1包括在高/低沙尘暴露地区的三波随访数据（801人次），以检查肺功能。研究2分别在高/低沙尘暴露地区使用147名和73名学生来建立我们的健康教育干预措施。采用配对检验、重复测量方差分析和广义估计方程来分析短期和长期影响。结果表明，安装了防护设备的学校中，学生的肺功能得到了改善。健康教育（如正确佩戴口罩和我们设计的PM全覆盖防沙服的使用）提高了学生与河流沙尘事件相关的认知和行为，并产生了短期和长期影响。因此，我们建议更多沙尘暴露风险高的学校采用防护设备和健康教育计划。我们设计的PM全覆盖防沙服不仅可以防止雾霾，还可以防止COVID-19等传染病的飞沫传播。
