Comments and recommendations on Sponge City — China's solutions to prevent flooding risks

BACKGROUND: /Objective: Flooding risk is a global issue, and various approaches have been established to prevent flooding risk around the world. China is one of the heavily flood-affected countries and has been implementing the Sponge City program since 2015 to defend against flooding. Unfortunately, flooding has been common in China in recent years, causing severe health risks to citizens. This research mainly focuses on (a) evaluating the implementation of China's Sponge City program and the associated impacts on human health and (b) exploring the future improvement of the Sponge City program in China. METHODS: The Interpretive Document Approach was used to explore an inclusive review of the Sponge City program and its implications on human health. RESULTS: /Findings: The Sponge City program in China is still insufficient to prevent flooding risks effectively. In the past eight years, 24/34 provinces have recorded flooding, which caused a total of 4701 deaths and over 525.5 billion RMB (around 72.9 billion US$) in economic loss. Till now, only 64/654 cities have promulgated local legislation to manage sponge city construction, although the Sponge City was implemented in 2015. Besides, the completed Sponge City program constructions cannot fully prevent flooding risks, the flood prevention capacity is limited. The Sponge City program is not granted priority, lacking national legislation hinders Sponge City program implementation in China. CONCLUSIONS: China needs to make national legislation on the Sponge City program and update the Sponge City program technology guidelines. Local governments should implement Sponge City construction according to local geographic environments.