Interaction among Air Pollution, National Health, and Economic Development

Abstract

This paper constructs a vector autoregressive (VAR) model and vector error correction (VECM) model, analyzes the air pollution, economic development, and national health of China from 1990 to 2019, and evaluates the economic losses from the respiratory diseases caused by air pollution. The results show that: (1) China’s economy continues to grow, and the corresponding amount of exhaust gas emissions (during the study period) showed a trend of first increasing and then slowly decreasing. (2) The overall burden of respiratory diseases in China showed a downward trend, with significant differences in gender and age. (3) A significant long-term equilibrium relationship existed between per capita gross domestic product (PGDP), exhaust emissions, and the disability-adjusted life years (DALYs) of the respiratory disease burden. Exhaust emissions will bring about short-term fluctuations of PGDP and disease burden DALYs. Air pollution is mainly caused by exhaust gas emissions, and DALYs and PGDP have little effect on air pollution. (4) Indirect economic losses from respiratory diseases caused by air pollution are likely to be long-term and will impose increasing pressure. On the basis of the healthy and sustainable operation of the economic system, the government should effectively prevent environmental health risks and improve the pollution treatment level.