Effect of Asian dust storms on daily mortality in seven metropolitan cities of Korea

The adverse effects of dust storms on health have been major issue in several countries. However, the results of the studies on the association between dust storms and mortality are inconsistent. Thus, this study aims to explore the effect of Asian dust storms on daily mortality in Korea.
We used Generalized additive model with Quasi-Poisson regressions. We considered the lag effect of dust and controlled for temperature, humidity, air pressure, seasons and time trends. Also, we performed additional analyses which adjusted for SO2, NO2, and PM10 respectively. We performed a meta-analysis of seven metropolitan cities in Korea to estimate the pooled effects. we found significant positive associations between Asian dust storms and mortality at lag 0 (cardiovascular: 2.91%; 95% CI:0.13, 5.77, male: 2.74%; 95% CI: 0.74, 4.77 and <65 years: 2.52%; 95% CI: 0.06, 5.04), at lag 2 (male 2.4%;95% CI: 0.43, 4.4 and <65 years: 2.49%; 95% CI: 0.07, 4.97), at lag 3 (total non-accidental: 1.57%; 95% CI: 0.11, 3.06, male: 2.24%; 95% CI: 0.28, 4.25 and <65 years: 2.43%; 95% CI: 0.01, 4.91) and at lag 5 (cardiovascular: 3.7%; 95% CI: 0.93, 6.54 and male: 2.04%, 95 CI: 0.08, 4.04) in the NO2-adjusted model.
This study first shows the significant relationship between ADS and mortality in Korea. .