Household Air Pollution from Coal and Biomass Fuels in China: Measurements, Health Impacts, and Interventions
By J. Zhang, Kirk R. Smith. Environmental Health Perspectives, 2007
766 citations recorded by the source corpus.
Objective Nearly all China’s rural residents and a shrinking fraction of urban residents use solid fuels (biomass and coal) for household cooking and/or heating. Consequently, global meta-analyses of epidemiologic studies indicate that indoor air pollution from solid fuel use in China is responsible for approximately 420,000 premature deaths annually, more than the approximately 300,000 attributed to urban outdoor air pollution in the country. Our objective in this review was to help elucidate the extent of this indoor air pollution health hazard. Data sources We reviewed approximately 200 publications in both Chinese- and English-language journals that reported health effects, exposure characteristics, and fuel/stove intervention options. Conclusions Observed health effects include respiratory illnesses, lung cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, weakening of the immune system, and reduction in lung function. Arsenic poisoning and fluorosis resulting from the use of “poisonous” coal have been observed in certain regions of China. Although attempts have been made in a few studies to identify specific coal smoke constituents responsible for specific adverse health effects, the majority of indoor air measurements include those of only particulate matter, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, and/or nitrogen dioxide. These measurements indicate that pollution levels in households using solid fuel generally exceed China’s indoor air quality standards. Intervention technologies ranging from simply adding a chimney to the more complex modernized bioenergy program are available, but they can be viable only with coordinated support from the government and the commercial sector.
Subfields: Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis, Pollution, Sociology and Political Science
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/77b546f40329b32a0d9e9e7ece87cea884e3eb56
How researchers see this paper
The researchers whose trusted networks rank it highest, strongest advocate first. Every researcher gets a different order.
In Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis
In Pollution
In Sociology and Political Science
Citations in the corpus
- Urbanisation and health in China (2010, neutral): “Boston, MA: Health Effects Institute, 2004 [62] Zhang J, Smith KR.”
- Acrolein: sources, metabolism, and biomolecular interactions relevant to human health and disease. (2008, background): “Similarly, cooking in poorly ventilated kitchens has been associated with respiratory illnesses, weakening of the immune system, and lung cancer in rural China [142].”
- Access to modern energy: a review of barriers, drivers and impacts (2016, background): “…and environmental science supports the existence of a strong positive association between IAP and negative health outcomes (Dutta et al., 2007; Zhang and Smith, 2007), as well as between cooking fuels and morbidity (among them are Ezzati and Kammen, 2002; Gajate-Garrido, 2013; Mueller et al.,…”