Perceived Risk in the Population Living near the Turin Incinerator: Comparison between before and at Three Years of Operation.

When the Turin incinerator went into operation in 2013, it was accompanied by surveillance of health effects that included a human biomonitoring survey of 394 residents. They responded to items investigating their awareness of environmental and health issues and perception of environmental health risks. In this study, we compared the questionnaire responses before plant startup and at 3 years of operation.

Risk perception in the population living near the Turin municipal solid waste incineration plant: survey results before start-up and communication strategies.

Background: The start-up of the Turin municipal solid waste incineration plant (2013) was accompanied by surveillance of health effects, which included a human biomonitoring campaign. Here we present the results of the risk perception survey of local residents before the plant went into operation.

Methods: The survey sample was 394 local residents: 198 residing near the plant (exposed group) and 196 residing in an area distant from the plant site (unexposed group).

Human biomonitoring health surveillance for metals near a waste-to-energy incinerator: The 1-year post-operam study.

This human biomonitoring (HBM) follow-up survey, within the SPoTT project, assessed the temporal and spatial trends of exposure to 18 metals in a cohort living around the waste-to-energy (WTE) incinerator of Turin (Italy) before (T0, 2013) and after 1-year of plant activity (T1, 2014). Urine of 380 adult individuals (186 exposed and 194 unexposed subjects, classified on fallout maps) were analyzed by sector field inductively coupled mass spectrometry. A decrease trend of the majority of metals in all subjects indicates that the overall air quality of the studied sites was not significantly compromised, also in proximity of the WTE plant, as corroborated also by air monitoring data of the regional agency.

Comparison of early childhood vaccination coverage and timeliness between children born to Italian women and those born to foreign women residing in Italy: A multi-centre retrospective cohort study.

Background: Compared to hosting populations, immigrants are usually considered more vulnerable to communicable diseases, many of which are vaccine-preventable. This study aims to estimate vaccination coverage (VC) and timeliness in children born to women from high migratory pressure countries (HMPC) and to evaluate factors affecting differences with children born to Italian women or women from advanced development countries (ITA + ADC).

Methods: We retrospectively analysed data of children born in 2009-2014 and resident in areas served by three local health units in the cities of Rome (n = 40,284), Turin (n = 49,600), and Treviso (n = 20,080).

[Population health surveillance of the general population living near Turin (Northern Italy) incinerator (SPoTT): methodology of the study].

Si intende qui descrivere il sistema di sorveglianza sugli effetti sulla salute (SpoTT) dell'inquinamento ambientale nelle aree circostanti l'inceneritore di Torino. SPoTT ha 3 linee di attività: 1. monitoraggio epidemiologico degli effetti a breve termine attraverso analisi temporali e misura della correlazione tra livelli giornalieri di emissioni dell'impianto e andamento degli eventi individuati dagli archivi dei dimessi (SDO), di pronto soccorso e di mortalità; sono coinvolti coloro che nel 2013-2018 risiedevano nell'area di ricaduta delle emissioni; 2.

Biomonitoring and exposure assessment of people living near or working at an Italian waste incinerator: methodology of the SPoTT study.

Only few studies on the health effect of waste incinerators were focused on human biomonitoring (HBM). Our aim is to describe a protocol for assessing early variation of selected items in a population group living close to a waste incinerator in Turin, Italy. A cohort of 394 subjects was randomly selected, among residents near the incinerator and residents far from it.

Human biomonitoring of metals in adults living near a waste-to-energy incinerator in ante-operam phase: Focus on reference values and health-based assessments.

The human biomonitoring (HBM) of metals is a part of the ongoing project SPoTT for the longitudinal health surveillance of the population living near a waste-to-energy (WTE) incinerator (Turin, Italy). The HBM of metals in the SPoTT population aimed to evaluate: i) reference values (RVs) before the WTE incinerator started operation; ii) differences in exposure by variables; iii) variations respect to other HBM studies; iv) exposure that exceeds the available health-based benchmarks as the Biomonitoring Equivalents (BEs) for urine Cd and Human Biomonitoring (HBM-I and HBM-II) values for urine Hg, Tl, and blood Pb; v) risk assessment by generating hazard quotients (HQs) for the single metal and hazard index (HI) for the co-occurrence of metals. Eighteen metals in urine and Pb in blood were determined by sector field inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry.

The EUROMED CANCER network: state-of-art of cancer screening programmes in non-EU Mediterranean countries.

Background: The EUROMED CANCER Network project aims to support non-EU Mediterranean countries in the development of cancer early detection and screening policies.

Methods: Through a structured questionnaire information from 15 countries (Albania, Algeria, Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), Croatia, Egypt, Jordan, UN Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo, Lebanon, Montenegro, Morocco, Palestinian National Authority, Serbia, Syria, Tunisia and Turkey) were collected on cancer epidemiology and control.

Results: Large differences between countries are evident.

Effectiveness of therapies for heroin addiction in retaining patients in treatment: results from the VEdeTTE study.

Treatment is effective in reducing heroin use and clinical and social problems among heroin addicts. The effectiveness is related to the duration of treatment. "VEdeTTE" is an Italian longitudinal study funded by the Ministry of Health to evaluate the effectiveness of treatments provided by the National Health Services.

[Mortality of drug users attending public treatment centers in Italy 1998-2001: a cohort study].

Objectives: to describe the overall and cause-specific mortality among heroin users attending Public Treatment Centers (PTCs) in Italy and to estimate the impact of heroin use on mortality in the general population.

Setting And Participants: A cohort of 10,376 patients (8881 men and 1495 women) enrolled over a period of 18 months between september 1998 and september 2000 and followed-up through 31st of March 2001 (VEdeTTE study).

Results: 190 deaths occurred during the study period (153 men and 37 women): 70 deaths were due to overdose (36.

Risk of fatal overdose during and after specialist drug treatment: the VEdeTTE study, a national multi-site prospective cohort study.

Background: Specialist drug treatment is critical to overdose prevention; methadone maintenance is effective, but we lack evidence for other modalities. We evaluate the impact of a range of treatments for opiate dependence on overdose mortality.

Methods: Prospective cohort study of 10,454 heroin users entering treatment 1998-2001 in Italy followed-up for 10,208 person-years in treatment and 2,914 person-years out of treatment.

VEdeTTE, a longitudinal study on effectiveness of treatments for heroin addiction in Italy: study protocol and characteristics of study population.

The aim of this study was to provide a methodological overview of the study design of the national evaluation large-scale study VEdeTTE and a description of the VEdeTTE study population and to compare enrollments with refusals and the study population with the overall clients at the National Health System (NHS) treatment centers. VEdeTTE is a longitudinal study of heroin addicts recruited in 115 NHS treatment centers in Italy, 1998-2001; 11,903 people were enrolled, 3876 refused to participate; data were analysed on 10,454. Information from refusals was compared to enrollments.