A spatial indicator of environmental and climatic vulnerability in Rome.

Background: Urban areas are disproportionately affected by multiple pressures from overbuilding, traffic, air pollution, and heat waves that often interact and are interconnected in producing health effects. A new synthetic tool to summarize environmental and climatic vulnerability has been introduced for the city of Rome, Italy, to provide the basis for environmental and health policies.

Methods: From a literature overview and based on the availability of data, several macro-dimensions were identified on 1,461 grid cells with a width of 1 km in Rome: land use, roads and traffic-related exposure, green space data, soil sealing, air pollution (PM, PM, NO, CH, SO), urban heat island intensity.

Lessons learnt for air pollution mitigation policies from the COVID-19 pandemic: The Italian perspective.

Policies to improve air quality need to be based on effective plans for reducing anthropogenic emissions. In 2020, the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic resulted in significant reductions of anthropogenic pollutant emissions, offering an unexpected opportunity to observe their consequences on ambient concentrations. Taking the national lockdown occurred in Italy between March and May 2020 as a case study, this work tries to infer if and what lessons may be learnt concerning the impact of emission reduction policies on air quality.

Multiannual assessment of the desert dust impact on air quality in Italy combining PM10 data with physics-based and geostatistical models.

Desert dust storms pose real threats to air quality and health of millions of people in source regions, with associated impacts extending to downwind areas. Europe (EU) is frequently affected by atmospheric transport of desert dust from the Northern Africa and Middle East drylands. This investigation aims at quantifying the role of desert dust transport events on air quality (AQ) over Italy, which is among the EU countries most impacted by this phenomenon.

A global observational analysis to understand changes in air quality during exceptionally low anthropogenic emission conditions.

This global study, which has been coordinated by the World Meteorological Organization Global Atmospheric Watch (WMO/GAW) programme, aims to understand the behaviour of key air pollutant species during the COVID-19 pandemic period of exceptionally low emissions across the globe. We investigated the effects of the differences in both emissions and regional and local meteorology in 2020 compared with the period 2015-2019. By adopting a globally consistent approach, this comprehensive observational analysis focuses on changes in air quality in and around cities across the globe for the following air pollutants PM, PM, PMC (coarse fraction of PM), NO, SO, NOx, CO, O and the total gaseous oxidant (OX = NO + O) during the pre-lockdown, partial lockdown, full lockdown and two relaxation periods spanning from January to September 2020.

Morbidity and mortality of people who live close to municipal waste landfills: a multisite cohort study.

Background: The evidence on the health effects related to residing close to landfills is controversial. Nine landfills for municipal waste have been operating in the Lazio region (Central Italy) for several decades. We evaluated the potential health effects associated with contamination from landfills using the estimated concentration of hydrogen sulphide (H2S) as exposure.

Mortality and morbidity in a population exposed to multiple sources of air pollution: A retrospective cohort study using air dispersion models.

Background And Aims: A landfill, an incinerator, and a refinery plant have been operating since the early 1960s in a contaminated site located in the suburb of Rome (Italy). To evaluate their potential health effects, a population-based retrospective cohort study was conducted using dispersion modeling for exposure assessment.

Methods: A fixed cohort was enrolled in the Rome Longitudinal Study in 2001, mortality and hospitalizations were followed-up until 2010.

[Morbidity in a population living close to urban waste incinerator plants in Lazio Region (Central Italy): a retrospective cohort study using a before-after design].

Background: the body of evidence on health effects of residential exposure to urban waste incinerators suggests association with reproductive outcomes and some cancers, but the overall evidence is still limited.

Objectives: we evaluated the impact of two incinerators on hospital admissions for respiratory and cardiovascular diseases in a cohort of people living nearby two incineration plants in Lazio Region (Central Italy) using a before-and-after design.

Methods: the study area was defined as the 7-km radius around the incinerators.

Comparing land use regression and dispersion modelling to assess residential exposure to ambient air pollution for epidemiological studies.

Background: Land-use regression (LUR) and dispersion models (DM) are commonly used for estimating individual air pollution exposure in population studies. Few comparisons have however been made of the performance of these methods.

Objectives: Within the European Study of Cohorts for Air Pollution Effects (ESCAPE) we explored the differences between LUR and DM estimates for NO2, PM10 and PM2.

[Air pollution in an urban area nearby the Rome-Ciampino city airport].

Objectives: to assess air pollution spatial and temporal variability in the urban area nearby the Ciampino International Airport (Rome) and to investigate the airport-related emissions contribute.

Design And Setting: the study domain was a 64 km2 area around the airport. Two fifteen-day monitoring campaigns (late spring, winter) were carried out.

[Residential cohort approach in industrial contaminated sites: the ERAS Lazio project].

The population-based cohort study is the best design for assessing the possible health effects resulting fromliving in contaminated sites. The ERAS (Epidemiology,Waste disposal, Environment and Health) Project was established to study the health of people living in close proximity to urban solid waste treatment (RU) plants in Lazio. It was conducted using an integrated approach, which consisted in studying mortality and hospital discharges of residential cohorts surrounding urban waste treatment plants.