Valutazione economica degli effetti sanitari dell’inquinamento atmosferico: La metodologia dell’EEA

TARANTO WORKSHOP ACTS 23/24 July 2012 In the European Union, poor air quality is the first environmental cause of premature death and has a cost in terms of human lives higher than that of road accidents. Air pollution is also the cause of the loss of days of work and of high health and social costs, since it affects the most vulnerable sections of the population (children, the elderly, asthmatics and disadvantaged people from the socio-economic point of view). ). The emission and concentration of pollutants in the air, while on the one hand they are certainly linked to phenomena of national and extra-national scale, on the other hand show a significant local variability that is linked to economic-productive choices as well as aspects social and other environmental components. In this perspective, the fight against pollution and the prevention of health risks are intimately linked and are certainly a priority to be pursued at local, national and international level, through targeted policies that know how to find the right balance between respecting the parameters of economic stability and the costs for the community deriving from the impact of pollutants on health; at the same time, they also represent a commitment that involves everyone, both at institutional level and at the level of individual citizens. In this sense, recent technological developments (APP on smartphone) are very promising, allowing the contributions of active citizenship to monitoring air quality.