Paper Number: EE-0205A&B

Document Date: 08/01/1985 and 01/01/1987

Author(s):  RAND Corporation: Coulson, Anne; Duan, N. Hayashi T., Keeler, E.B.; Forn, E.; Manning, W.G.

Subject Area(s): Economic Analysis, Benefits Analysis, Human Health Benefits, Air Pollution

Keywords: Economic Analysis, Benefits Analysis, Human Health Benefits, Air Pollution

Abstract: 

These reports pursue two objectives: to examine the health effects of air pollution on a general population in moderately polluted cities, and to apply a battery of disparate analytical approaches to an especially attractive set of data collected with the same data methods in two widely separated cities, Seattle and Dayton. The researchers used data collected during the The RAND Corporation's Health Insurance Experiment and employed a simple cross-sectional analysis and three panel analyses. Several analyses were undertaken, of which one using the day-to-day health responses of individuals was found to be the most promising. The first report yielded negative associations of air pollution with health for all pollutants except for ozone, but was applied only in Seattle.  The second study applied the Whittemore-Korn individual time series analysis to a general population dataset and found it to be a promising method for measuring the short-term health effects of air pollution. The results consistently identify sulfur dioxide and nitrogen dioxide as having significant adverse health effects.

This paper is part of the  Environmental Economics Research Inventory.

• Effects of Air Pollution on Health Outcomes (1985) (PDF)(168 pp, 33 MB, 08/01/1985, EE-0205A)
  This report examines the health effects of air pollution on a general population in moderately polluted cities, and to apply a battery of disparate analytical approaches to an especially attractive set of data collected with the same data methods in two widely separated cities, Seattle and Dayton The researchers used data collected during the The RAND Corporation's Health Insurance Experiment and employed a simple cross-sectional analysis and three panel analyses.
• Short-Term Health Effects of Air Pollution: A Case Study (1987) (PDF)(92 pp, 22 MB, 01/01/1987, EE-0205B)
  This report documents the findings of a study on the health effects of air pollution. The data on which the study is based were collected in Dayton, Ohio, in the Health Insurance Experiment conducted by RAND for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The authors applied the Whittemore-Korn individual time series analysis to a general population dataset and found it to be a promising method for measuring the short-term health effects of air pollution.