Economic Estimations of Pollution Related Cancer and Nerves Morbidity

Abstract

It was found that air pollution do influence health of population. The results suggest that air emissions and radiation are statistically significant causes of increase in the number of cancer, nerves, and urinary morbidity in Ukraine. Using fixed and random effect estimations for panel data analysis it is calculated economic values of health damages from outdoor air pollution and radiation. Air pollution is responsible on average for a) 3% of all cancer spread among population; b) 30% and 10.5% of man lung cancer and women lung cancer respectively; 17% of nerves morbidities treated in ambulatories and 9% of urinary and reproductive system morbidity. Ecological charges for air emissions constitute 0.1% of 2011 Ukrainian GDP, while estimated economic damages caused by air emissions for above mentioned morbidity are estimated at 0.3% GDP. The estimated air pollution costs are the minimal one since based only on several morbidities, do not consider pollution related mortalities, and do not consider other air pollution loses, such as agriculture harvest loses, climate change adaptation (and/or mitigation) costs, damages for buildings and infrastructure.