School of Public Health, Yale University Address: P.O. Box 208034, 60 College Street, New Haven, CT, 06520-0834, USA.
Jockey Club School of Public Health & Primary Care, The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.
Environ Res. 2021 Jun;197:111000. doi: 10.1016/j.envres.2021.111000. Epub 2021 Mar 19.
While associations between population health outcomes and some urban design characteristics, such as green space, urban heat islands (UHI), and walkability, have been well studied, no prior studies have examined the association of urban air ventilation and health outcomes. This study used data from Hong Kong, a densely populated city, to explore the association between urban air ventilation and mortality during 2008-2014. Frontal area density (FAD), was used to measure urban ventilation, with higher FAD indicating poorer ventilation, due to structures blocking wind penetration. Negative binomial regression models were constructed to regress mortality counts for each 5-year age group, gender, and small area group, on small area level variables including green space density, population density and socioeconomic indicators. An interquartile range increase in FAD was significantly associated with a 10% (95% confidence interval (CI) 2%-19%, p = 0.019) increase in all-cause mortality and a 21% (95% CI: 2%-45%, p = 0.030) increase in asthma mortality, and non-significantly associated with a 9% (95% CI: 1%-19%, p = 0.073) in cardio-respiratory mortality. Better urban ventilation can help disperse vehicle-related pollutants and allow moderation of UHIs, and for a coastal city may allow moderation of cold temperatures. Urban planning should take ventilation into account. Further studies on urban ventilation and health outcomes from different settings are needed.
尽管人口健康结果与一些城市设计特征（如绿色空间、城市热岛 (UHI) 和可步行性）之间的关联已经得到充分研究，但之前没有研究探讨城市空气通风与健康结果之间的关联。本研究使用来自人口稠密的香港的数据，探索 2008-2014 年期间城市空气通风与死亡率之间的关联。正面区域密度 (FAD) 用于衡量城市通风，较高的 FAD 表示由于建筑物阻挡了风的渗透，通风较差。构建了负二项回归模型，以回归每个 5 岁年龄组、性别和小区域组的死亡率计数，小区域水平变量包括绿色空间密度、人口密度和社会经济指标。FAD 的四分位距增加与全因死亡率增加 10%（95%置信区间 (CI) 2%-19%，p=0.019）和哮喘死亡率增加 21%（95% CI：2%-45%，p=0.030）显著相关，与心肺死亡率增加 9%（95% CI：1%-19%，p=0.073）无显著相关性。更好的城市通风可以帮助分散与车辆相关的污染物并缓和城市热岛效应，对于沿海城市，可能还可以缓和寒冷的温度。城市规划应考虑通风。需要来自不同环境的城市通风和健康结果的进一步研究。
