The association between daily-diagnosed COVID-19 morbidity and short-term exposure to PM1 is larger than associations with PM2.5 and PM10

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envres.2022.113016Get rights and content

Highlights

  • The first attempt to examine the association between PM1 and COVID-19 morbidity.

  • Short-term exposure to ambient PM1 is associated with COVID-19 morbidity.

  • Smaller particles are more highly associated with COVID-19 morbidity.

Abstract

Exposure to particulate matter (PM) could increase both susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 infection and severity of COVID-19 disease. Prior studies investigating associations between PM and COVID-19 morbidity have only considered PM2.5 or PM10, rather than PM1. We investigated the associations between daily-diagnosed COVID-19 morbidity and average exposures to ambient PM1 starting at 0 through 21 days before the day of diagnosis in 12 cities in China using a two-step analysis: a time-series quasi-Poisson analysis to analyze the associations in each city; and then a meta-analysis to estimate the overall association. Diagnosed morbidities and PM1 data were obtained from National Health Commission in China and China Meteorological Administration, respectively. We found association between short-term exposures to ambient PM1 with COVID-19 morbidity was significantly positive, and larger than the associations with PM2.5 and PM10. Percent increases in daily-diagnosed COVID-19 morbidity per IQR/10 PM1 for different moving averages ranged from 1.50% (−1.20%, 4.30%) to 241% (95%CI: 80.7%, 545%), with largest values for exposure windows starting at 17 days before diagnosis. Our results indicate that smaller particles are more highly associated with COVID-19 morbidity, and most of the effects from PM2.5 and PM10 on COVID-19 may be primarily due to the PM1. This study will be helpful for implementing measures and policies to control the spread of COVID-19.

Keywords

PM1
COVID-19
Time-serial analysis
China

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1

These authors contributed equally to this work.

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