Quantification of health effects related to SO2 and NO2 pollutants by using Air quality model

In the past few decades, the results of epidemiological studies have shown that there is a significant relationship between human health and air pollution. The aim of this study was to quantify the health effects, the estimated number of cases of death, cardiovascular and respiratory deaths attributed to NO2 and SO2 pollutants in Bukan city by Air Quality software. Bukan city has a population of 224,628 persons and an area of 2541.306 square kilometer. Raw data of SO2 and NO2 concentrations were received from the Department of Environment of Bukan city. To analyze the data, the Excel and Air quality 2.2.3 softwares were employed. The annual average of SO2 concentration was 85.61 μg m-3 which is higher than the WHO AQGs and Iranian National Standard. Air Quality model predicted that with every 10 μg m-3 increase in gaseous SO2, total, respiratory and cardiovascular mortality related to SO2 was 36.2, 7.8 and 29.9 deaths, respectively. The average concentration of NO2 was almost constant throughout the year. NO2 concentration in summer and winter seasons was 25.23 and 25.95 μg m-3, respectively. Consequently, 0.64 and 0.36% of the total and cardiovascular mortality was due to NO2, respectively. In conclusion, Air Quality software can be used for health risk assessment of SO2 and NO2 pollutants.