Application of COMEAP dose-response coefficients within a regulatory health impact assessment methodology

It is recognized that exposure to airborne pollutants can have a negative e ffect on human health. The Environment Agency in England and Wales has a st atutory responsibility under the Environment Act 1990 to regulate emissions to air from large industrial processes with regard to the requirements of the National Air Quality Strategy (NAQS). A technique was developed to appl y pollutant dose-response relationships published by the Committee on the M edical Effects of Air Pollutants (COMEAP) in a regulatory framework, incorp orating long-term sulphur dioxide concentration values obtained using an ai r dispersion model. Modelled long-term average sulphur dioxide concentratio n values for 102 electoral wards comprising an exposed area surrounding a h ypothetical industrial stack emission in southern England were incorporated into a human health impact assessment using COMEAP dose-response relations hips and annual baseline health data. Additional numbers of deaths brought forward and respiratory hospital admissions per annum resulting from the hy pothetical sulphur dioxide emission were estimated. A second calculation us ing monthly baseline health data and monthly averaged concentration values was carried out to assess the sensitivity of the estimate of health impact to seasonal variability of baseline health and modelled average concentrati on datasets. The annual incremental impact varied by 1.49 per cent between the 'annual' and 'sum of 12 months' analyses, suggesting that annual averag ed modelled concentration values and annual baseline health data are suffic ient for use in regulatory health impact assessments for large industrial p rocesses using the COMEAP approach.