Abstract—The core aim of this paper is to investigate the
health impacts of PM10 in Makkah (March 2012 to February
2013). The annual average of PM10 concentration was 195
μg/m3, which is greater than both EC and PME annual
standards. Daily average concentrations also exceeded PME
and EC standards. Furthermore, health assessment is carried
out using AirQ2.2.3 model to estimate the number of hospital
admissions due to respiratory diseases. The cumulative
number of average hospital admission due to respiratory
illnesses during the study period was 112665, cumulative
number of cases per 100,000 was 2504 and the concentrationresponse
coefficient was 2.342 (95% CI 1.899 - 2.785) per 10
μg/m3 increase of PM10. The violation of daily and annual air
quality standars and the results of AirQ2.2.3 suggest potential
negative health impact for the residents, especially for more
vulnerable groups, such as old aged, children and people with
asthma and other respiratory diseases.
Index Terms—Air pollution, exceedences, health effects,
makkah.
Turki M. Habeebullah is with The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques
Institute for Hajj and Umrah Research, Umm Al-Qura University, Saudi
Arabia (e-mail: t_habeebullah@yahoo.com).
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Cite:Turki M. Habeebullah, "Modeling Particulate Matter (PM10) in Makkah, Saudi Arabia - A View Point of Health Impact," Journal of Clean Energy Technologies vol. 2, no. 3, pp. 196-200, 2014.
