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Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic
The COVID-19 global pandemic has likely affected air quality due to extreme changes in human behavior. We assessed air quality during the COVID-19 pandemic for fine particulate matter (PM(2.5)) and nitrogen dioxide (NO(2)) in the continental United States from January 8th-April 21st in 2017–2020. We...
Autores principales: | , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
Elsevier B.V.
2020
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7442629/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32512381 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.139864 |
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author | Berman, Jesse D. Ebisu, Keita |
author_facet | Berman, Jesse D. Ebisu, Keita |
author_sort | Berman, Jesse D. |
collection | PubMed |
description | The COVID-19 global pandemic has likely affected air quality due to extreme changes in human behavior. We assessed air quality during the COVID-19 pandemic for fine particulate matter (PM(2.5)) and nitrogen dioxide (NO(2)) in the continental United States from January 8th-April 21st in 2017–2020. We considered pollution during the COVID-19 period (March 13–April 21st) and the pre-COVID-19 period (January 8th-March 12th) with 2020 representing ‘current’ data and 2017–2019 representing ‘historical’ data. County-level pollution concentrations were compared between historical versus current periods, and counties were stratified by institution of early or late non-essential business closures. Statistically significant NO(2) declines were observed during the current COVID-19 period compared to historical data: a 25.5% reduction with absolute decrease of 4.8 ppb. PM(2.5) also showed decreases during the COVID-19 period, and the reduction is statistically significant in urban counties and counties from states instituting early non-essential business closures. Understanding how air pollution is affected during COVID-19 pandemic will provide important clues regarding health effects and control of emissions. Further investigation is warranted to link this finding with health implications. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-7442629 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2020 |
publisher | Elsevier B.V. |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-74426292021-01-26 Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic Berman, Jesse D. Ebisu, Keita Sci Total Environ Article The COVID-19 global pandemic has likely affected air quality due to extreme changes in human behavior. We assessed air quality during the COVID-19 pandemic for fine particulate matter (PM(2.5)) and nitrogen dioxide (NO(2)) in the continental United States from January 8th-April 21st in 2017–2020. We considered pollution during the COVID-19 period (March 13–April 21st) and the pre-COVID-19 period (January 8th-March 12th) with 2020 representing ‘current’ data and 2017–2019 representing ‘historical’ data. County-level pollution concentrations were compared between historical versus current periods, and counties were stratified by institution of early or late non-essential business closures. Statistically significant NO(2) declines were observed during the current COVID-19 period compared to historical data: a 25.5% reduction with absolute decrease of 4.8 ppb. PM(2.5) also showed decreases during the COVID-19 period, and the reduction is statistically significant in urban counties and counties from states instituting early non-essential business closures. Understanding how air pollution is affected during COVID-19 pandemic will provide important clues regarding health effects and control of emissions. Further investigation is warranted to link this finding with health implications. Elsevier B.V. 2020-10-15 2020-06-01 /pmc/articles/PMC7442629/ /pubmed/32512381 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.139864 Text en © 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID-19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active. |
spellingShingle | Article Berman, Jesse D. Ebisu, Keita Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title | Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_full | Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_fullStr | Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_full_unstemmed | Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_short | Changes in U.S. air pollution during the COVID-19 pandemic |
title_sort | changes in u.s. air pollution during the covid-19 pandemic |
topic | Article |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7442629/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/32512381 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2020.139864 |
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