National Research Council, IFT, Palermo, Italy.
Environmental Research Group, Imperial College, London, UK.
Environ Health. 2024 Nov 14;23(1):98. doi: 10.1186/s12940-024-01136-5.
Epidemiologic research and quantitative risk assessment play a crucial role in transferring fundamental scientific knowledge to policymakers so they can take action to reduce the burden of ambient air pollution. This commentary addresses several challenges in quantitative risk assessment of air pollution that require close attention. The background to this discussion provides a summary of and conclusions from the epidemiological evidence on ambient air pollution and health outcomes accumulated since the 1990s. We focus on identifying relevant exposure-health outcome pairs, the associated concentration-response functions to be applied in a risk assessment, and several caveats in their application. We propose a structured and comprehensive framework for assessing the evidence levels associated with each exposure-health outcome pair within a health impact assessment context. Specific issues regarding the use of global or regional concentration-response functions, their shape, and the range of applicability are discussed.
流行病学研究和定量风险评估在将基础科学知识传递给政策制定者方面发挥着至关重要的作用，以便他们能够采取行动来减轻环境空气污染的负担。本评论探讨了定量风险评估中需要密切关注的几个空气污染挑战。本文讨论的背景提供了自 20 世纪 90 年代以来环境空气污染与健康结果相关的流行病学证据的总结和结论。我们重点确定相关的暴露-健康结果对，以及在风险评估中应用的相关浓度-反应函数，以及它们应用中的一些注意事项。我们提出了一个结构化和全面的框架，用于评估健康影响评估背景下每个暴露-健康结果对相关的证据水平。讨论了使用全球或区域浓度-反应函数、它们的形状和适用范围的具体问题。
