Graham, AM orcid.org/0000-0003-2349-3787, Pringle, KJ orcid.org/0000-0003-2190-5258, Pope, RJ orcid.org/0000-0002-3587-837X et al. (12 more authors) (2021) Impact of the 2019/2020 Australian Megafires on Air Quality and Health. GeoHealth, 5 (10). e2021GH000454. ISSN 2471-1403
Abstract
The Australian 2019/2020 bushfires were unprecedented in their extent and intensity, causing a catastrophic loss of habitat, human and animal life across eastern-Australia. We use a regional air quality model to assess the impact of the bushfires on particulate matter with a diameter less than 2.5 μm (PM2.5) concentrations and the associated health impact from short-term population exposure to bushfire PM2.5. The mean population Air Quality Index (AQI) exposure between September and February in the fires and no fires simulations indicates an additional ∼437,000 people were exposed to “Poor” or worse AQI levels due to the fires. The AQ impact was concentrated in the cities of Sydney, Newcastle-Maitland, Canberra-Queanbeyan and Melbourne. Between October and February 171 (95% CI: 66–291) deaths were brought forward due to short-term exposure to bushfire PM2.5. The health burden was largest in New South Wales (NSW) (109 (95% CI: 41–176) deaths brought forward), Queensland (15 (95% CI: 5–24)), and Victoria (35 (95% CI: 13–56)). This represents 38%, 13% and 30% of the total deaths brought forward by short-term exposure to all PM2.5. At a city-level 65 (95% CI: 24–105), 23 (95% CI: 9–38) and 9 (95% CI: 4–14) deaths were brought forward from short-term exposure to bushfire PM2.5, accounting for 36%, 20%, and 64% of the total deaths brought forward from all PM2.5. Thus, the bushfires caused substantial AQ and health impacts across eastern-Australia. Climate change is projected to increase bushfire risk, therefore future fire management policies should consider this.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2021 The Authors. GeoHealth published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of American Geophysical Union. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited and is not used for commercial purposes. |
Keywords: | air quality; wildfire; bushfire; PM2.5; health impact assessment; Australia |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Leeds |
Academic Units: | The University of Leeds > Faculty of Environment (Leeds) > School of Earth and Environment (Leeds) > Inst for Climate & Atmos Science (ICAS) (Leeds) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Publications |
Date Deposited: | 19 Nov 2021 10:44 |
Last Modified: | 09 Jan 2025 09:51 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | American Geophysical Union |
Identification Number: | 10.1029/2021gh000454 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:180238 |