Absolute humidity of atmospheric air and COVID-19

Abstract

Today COVID-19 is number one global point of focus. Therefore, study of the effects of environmental conditions, in which exist pandemic subjects — people and viruses, on pandemic dynamics and results is extremely important. The authors made a correlation analysis of dependence between incidence/mortality of population and absolute and relative humidity in 73 countries and regions on different continents of the Earth. The methodology developed defines how and in what periods of time the environmental factors effect on human incidence and mortality, how strongly particular atmospheric parameter affects the process of infection and disease flow. The undertaken calculations allowed to prove that the absolute humidity is one of the dominant natural factor which influences on pandemic COVID-19 and other infectious diseases dynamics. The growth of absolute air humidity can have both positive and negative effect on incidence and mortality of population while the effect’s character depends on absolute humidity’s own level and other atmospheric parameters. Correlation of absolute and relative humidity with incidence/mortality at the same time can be different in value or sign. Existing regulations at the federal level in Russian Federation are established without taking into account the minimum allowable and physiologically optimal value of absolute humidity, and need corrections. The question of the impact of absolute humidity is of great importance for northern territories, where most of the year the value of absolute humidity is less than the minimum allowed. The achieved results show high degree of the impact of absolute humidity on incidence and mortality of population due to COVID-19 and contribute to better understanding of pandemic peaks cyclicality and conscious forecasting of start of periods of the most dangerous epidemiological reality.