Update of the WHO global air quality guidelines: Systematic reviews – An introduction

This paper aims to serve as an introduction to the Special Issue in Environment International entitled “Update of the WHO Global Air Quality Guidelines: Systematic Reviews”. The article has two main objectives. One is to provide the context to this Special Issue, related to (a) policy context, overall exposure to air pollution, and burden of disease attributable to air pollution, and the other is to describe (b) the WHO guideline development process, with special emphasis on the systematic reviews. In particular, this paper presents the systematic reviews and other supporting evidence that was used and discussed during the process and summarizes important methodological information about the approaches taken to conduct the systematic reviews. These approaches include the definition of population, exposure, comparator, outcomes and study design (PECOS) questions, the assessment of the risk of bias in individual studies and the assessment of the overall certainty of the evidence. In summary, the new WHO global air quality guidelines are informed by the best available scientific evidence covering a vast number of research papers published until September 2018, and appraised by experts and stakeholders in the field of air quality. However, research gaps remain and, therefore, further research is warranted.