TY - JOUR
T1 - Human mortality in Cyprus
T2 - the role of temperature and particulate air pollution
AU - Tsangari, Haritini
AU - Paschalidou, Anastasia
AU - Vardoulakis, Sotiris
AU - Heaviside, Clare
AU - Konsoula, Zoi
AU - Christou, Stephanie
AU - Georgiou, Kyriakos E.
AU - Ioannou, Kyriaki
AU - Mesimeris, Theodoulos
AU - Kleanthous, Savvas
AU - Pashiardis, Stelios
AU - Pavlou, Pavlos
AU - Kassomenos, Pavlos
AU - Yamasaki, Edna N.
N1 - Funding Information:
The Project CYPHEW (ΥΓΕΙΑ/ΔΥΓΕΙΑ/0609(ΒΙΕ)/20) is co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund and the Republic of Cyprus through the Research Promotion Foundation. The authors would also like to thank two anonymous reviewers for valuable comments and suggestions.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2015, Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.
PY - 2015/4/19
Y1 - 2015/4/19
N2 - Climatic change results in increased occurrence of heat waves, and the thermal stress caused by such phenomena is leading to higher levels of heat-related mortality worldwide. This study is the first to examine the effect of extreme weather on mortality in Cyprus. It investigates the individual effect of meteorological indicators on mortality, as well as the role of particulate air pollution (PM10). A generalized linear model (GLM) with quasi-Poisson regression was implemented. GLM included a temperature function and was adjusted for relative humidity and seasonality. The temperature function was developed under a newly developed framework of distributed lag nonlinear models, which capture nonlinearities and delayed effects of heat simultaneously. GLM was extended to examine the confounding effect of air pollution. All the results on heat effects are presented. High temperatures had a significant effect on mortality with increased mortality rates, independent of humidity and seasonality. Mortality risk increased steeply above a temperature threshold. A direct heat effect was shown, with higher risk on the current and next day of a severe heat event. PM10 was not found to have a confounding effect on the temperature–mortality relationship, since the strength of this relationship remained after the inclusion of PM10 in the model. Differences existed between urban and coastal areas.
AB - Climatic change results in increased occurrence of heat waves, and the thermal stress caused by such phenomena is leading to higher levels of heat-related mortality worldwide. This study is the first to examine the effect of extreme weather on mortality in Cyprus. It investigates the individual effect of meteorological indicators on mortality, as well as the role of particulate air pollution (PM10). A generalized linear model (GLM) with quasi-Poisson regression was implemented. GLM included a temperature function and was adjusted for relative humidity and seasonality. The temperature function was developed under a newly developed framework of distributed lag nonlinear models, which capture nonlinearities and delayed effects of heat simultaneously. GLM was extended to examine the confounding effect of air pollution. All the results on heat effects are presented. High temperatures had a significant effect on mortality with increased mortality rates, independent of humidity and seasonality. Mortality risk increased steeply above a temperature threshold. A direct heat effect was shown, with higher risk on the current and next day of a severe heat event. PM10 was not found to have a confounding effect on the temperature–mortality relationship, since the strength of this relationship remained after the inclusion of PM10 in the model. Differences existed between urban and coastal areas.
KW - Cyprus
KW - Distributed lag nonlinear model
KW - Extreme weather
KW - Generalized linear model
KW - Heat effect
KW - Particulate matter
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84928141055&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s10113-015-0793-2
DO - 10.1007/s10113-015-0793-2
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84928141055
SN - 1436-3798
VL - 16
SP - 1905
EP - 1913
JO - Regional Environmental Change
JF - Regional Environmental Change
IS - 7
ER -