Review of the Air Quality Criteria Document for Particulate Matter

Med., 2000.B. Papers not previously cited:1. Gilliland, F.D. et al. (2001). The effects of ambient airpollution on school absenteeism due to respiratory illnesses.Epidemiol. 12:45-54.2. Avol, E.L. et al. (submitted). Respiratory effects ofrelocating to areas of differing air pollution levels.3. McConnell et al. (in preparation). Childhood asthmaexacerbation and fine particulate air pollution in SouthernCalifornia.Contact Dr. John M. Peters at USC for copies of these papers.p. 9-90 11-17 The section on the ROFA studies needs to acknowledge thatthe effects observed were attributed to much higherconcentrations than those that occur in ambient air.p. 9-104 1-4 This discussion needs to distinguish between infants andchildren. Premature mortality occurs among infants(< 1 year of age) but not in children over one year of age.Excess morbidity and functional decrements are seen inchildren, especially those active out-of-doors. Lumping thetwo groups together is misleading and incorrect.CHAPTER 6 EPIDEMIOLOGY - General CommentThe authors of Chapter 6 are to be commended for an outstanding scholarly summary andsynthesis of an enormous and highly complex literature on PM epidemiology. Itcomprehensively reviews the peer reviewed literature and systematically addresses what isknown, what is uncertain, and what issues need to be resolved by further research.One background topic not specifically addressed is the role that past regulatory decisionson the selection of PM indices have played in the evolution of the PM epidemiologic literaturebase. The adoption of PM10 in 1987, and of PM2.5 in 1997, have generated ambient airconcentration databases that made it possible for epidemiologic researchers to address andresolve many of the previously unresolved linkages between airborne PM and human health, andthe newly authorized network of speciation samples holds promise for further advances in thenear future on the identification of the more influential components of the ambient pollutionmixture.While there must, of necessity, be an end to the inclusion of newly accepted peerreviewed literature, the authors should make every attempt possible to include more of theemerging research findings as possible. In this regard, I call the attention of the authors to someof the potentially most important papers of which this reviewer is aware. In this regard, the textof this section should be expanded to reflect some recent relevant research reports, such as:1. The report by Laden et al. on the follow-up study of the 6-cities cohort (AbstractISEE-437, in: Epidemiol. 12(4): S81, July 2001), and the one by Pope et al. on the follow-upstudy of the ACS cohort (Abstract ISEE-205 in the same issue of Epidemiol.). The paper byPope et al. (ISEE-205) describes a follow-up analysis of the American Cancer Society cohort in51 U.S. cities for 16 years of mortality experience will report significant associations betweenPM2.5 and both cardiopulmonary and lung cancer mortality. (The Abstract that appears inEpidemiol., July 2001 does not describe the recently completed analyses.) There were noassociations of mortality with the coarse thoracic mass (PM10-2.5).A - 47