Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)

Background: the Lombardy region in Italy was the first area in Europe to record an outbreak of COVID-19 and one of the most affected worldwide. As this territory is strongly polluted, it was hypothesized that pollution had a role in facilitating the diffusion of the epidemic, but results are uncerta...

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Autores principales:	Lorenzo Gianquintieri, Maria Antonia Brovelli, Andrea Pagliosa, Rodolfo Bonora, Giuseppe Maria Sechi, Enrico Gianluca Caiani
Formato:	article
Lenguaje:	EN
Publicado:	MDPI AG 2021
Materias:	COVID-19 SARS-CoV-2 pollution health geomatics emergency medical services correlation analysis Medicine R
Acceso en línea:	https://doaj.org/article/e5e6933231234afaab1887d1eaa82e21
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spelling	oai:doaj.org-article:e5e6933231234afaab1887d1eaa82e212021-11-25T17:51:33ZGeospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)10.3390/ijerph1822121541660-46011661-7827https://doaj.org/article/e5e6933231234afaab1887d1eaa82e212021-11-01T00:00:00Zhttps://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/22/12154https://doaj.org/toc/1661-7827https://doaj.org/toc/1660-4601Background: the Lombardy region in Italy was the first area in Europe to record an outbreak of COVID-19 and one of the most affected worldwide. As this territory is strongly polluted, it was hypothesized that pollution had a role in facilitating the diffusion of the epidemic, but results are uncertain. Aim: the paper explores the effect of air pollutants in the first spread of COVID-19 in Lombardy, with a novel geomatics approach addressing the possible confounding factors, the reliability of data, the measurement of diffusion speed, and the biasing effect of the lockdown measures. Methods and results: all municipalities were assigned to one of five possible territorial classes (TC) according to land-use and socio-economic status, and they were grouped into districts of 100,000 residents. For each district, the speed of COVID-19 diffusion was estimated from the ambulance dispatches and related to indicators of mean concentration of air pollutants over 1, 6, and 12 months, grouping districts in the same TC. Significant exponential correlations were found for ammonia (NH<sub>3</sub>) in both prevalently agricultural (R<sup>2</sup> = 0.565) and mildly urbanized (R<sup>2</sup> = 0.688) areas. Conclusions: this is the first study relating COVID-19 estimated speed of diffusion with indicators of exposure to NH<sub>3</sub>. As NH<sub>3</sub> could induce oxidative stress, its role in creating a pre-existing fragility that could have facilitated SARS-CoV-2 replication and worsening of patient conditions could be speculated.Lorenzo GianquintieriMaria Antonia BrovelliAndrea PagliosaRodolfo BonoraGiuseppe Maria SechiEnrico Gianluca CaianiMDPI AGarticleCOVID-19SARS-CoV-2pollutionhealth geomaticsemergency medical servicescorrelation analysisMedicineRENInternational Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, Vol 18, Iss 12154, p 12154 (2021)
institution	DOAJ
collection	DOAJ
language	EN
topic	COVID-19 SARS-CoV-2 pollution health geomatics emergency medical services correlation analysis Medicine R
spellingShingle	COVID-19 SARS-CoV-2 pollution health geomatics emergency medical services correlation analysis Medicine R Lorenzo Gianquintieri Maria Antonia Brovelli Andrea Pagliosa Rodolfo Bonora Giuseppe Maria Sechi Enrico Gianluca Caiani Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)
description	Background: the Lombardy region in Italy was the first area in Europe to record an outbreak of COVID-19 and one of the most affected worldwide. As this territory is strongly polluted, it was hypothesized that pollution had a role in facilitating the diffusion of the epidemic, but results are uncertain. Aim: the paper explores the effect of air pollutants in the first spread of COVID-19 in Lombardy, with a novel geomatics approach addressing the possible confounding factors, the reliability of data, the measurement of diffusion speed, and the biasing effect of the lockdown measures. Methods and results: all municipalities were assigned to one of five possible territorial classes (TC) according to land-use and socio-economic status, and they were grouped into districts of 100,000 residents. For each district, the speed of COVID-19 diffusion was estimated from the ambulance dispatches and related to indicators of mean concentration of air pollutants over 1, 6, and 12 months, grouping districts in the same TC. Significant exponential correlations were found for ammonia (NH<sub>3</sub>) in both prevalently agricultural (R<sup>2</sup> = 0.565) and mildly urbanized (R<sup>2</sup> = 0.688) areas. Conclusions: this is the first study relating COVID-19 estimated speed of diffusion with indicators of exposure to NH<sub>3</sub>. As NH<sub>3</sub> could induce oxidative stress, its role in creating a pre-existing fragility that could have facilitated SARS-CoV-2 replication and worsening of patient conditions could be speculated.
format	article
author	Lorenzo Gianquintieri Maria Antonia Brovelli Andrea Pagliosa Rodolfo Bonora Giuseppe Maria Sechi Enrico Gianluca Caiani
author_facet	Lorenzo Gianquintieri Maria Antonia Brovelli Andrea Pagliosa Rodolfo Bonora Giuseppe Maria Sechi Enrico Gianluca Caiani
author_sort	Lorenzo Gianquintieri
title	Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)
title_short	Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)
title_full	Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)
title_fullStr	Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)
title_full_unstemmed	Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)
title_sort	geospatial correlation analysis between air pollution indicators and estimated speed of covid-19 diffusion in the lombardy region (italy)
publisher	MDPI AG
publishDate	2021
url	https://doaj.org/article/e5e6933231234afaab1887d1eaa82e21
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Geospatial Correlation Analysis between Air Pollution Indicators and Estimated Speed of COVID-19 Diffusion in the Lombardy Region (Italy)

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