Abstract
Background: Little is known on outdoor air pollution in a long-term perspective and societal costs such as sick leave. In the Nordic countries, recent pollution health impact assessments have had to rely on outdated studies.
Aims: To investigate if air pollution exposure is associated with sick leave 20 years later.
Methods: We analysed self-reported sick leave (all-cause and respiratory) in 7 466 subjects from Bergen, Gothenburg, Umea, Uppsala in the RHINE3 study in 2010-12. Home addresses were geocoded and linked to annual average concentrations of PM2.5, PM10 and NO2 at RHINE3, 10 years earlier and 20 years earlier, using existing land-use regression (LUR) models. We performed multilevel logistic regression clustered by centre, and adjusted for sex, smoking, education and previous health-related workplace change.
Results: Age range in RHINE3 was 40-66 yrs, 34% and 4% reported all-cause and respiratory sick leave during the last year. In the adjusted analyses all-cause sick leave was associated with PM2.5 20 years earlier (OR per interquartile range (IQR) difference (2.6 µg/m³) 1.12 (95%CI 1.01, 1.24)), and borderline with NO2 (OR per IQR diff (8.1 µg/m³) 1.09 (95%CI 0.99, 1.19)). Respiratory sick leave was associated with PM10 20 years earlier (OR per IQR diff (3.92 µg/m³) 1.54 (95%CI 1.06, 2.25)), and borderline with PM2.5 (OR per IQR diff 1.31 (95%CI 0.97, 1.76)). Pollution exposures at present as well as 10 years earlier were not significantly associated with sick leave.
Conclusions: Air pollution exposure in a general population is associated with sick leave in a 20-year perspective. Our findings suggest that even low air pollution levels such as in Northern Europe have societal costs over time.
Footnotes
Cite this article as: European Respiratory Journal 2018 52: Suppl. 62, OA5182.
This is an ERS International Congress abstract. No full-text version is available. Further material to accompany this abstract may be available at www.ers-education.org (ERS member access only).
- Copyright ©the authors 2018