Work

Standards for Official Statistics on Climate-Health Interactions (SOSCHI): All-cause mortality attributable to wildfire smoke: methodology

Year: 2024

Type: article

Abstract: Climate change is increasing the frequency, intensity, and duration of hot and dry conditions, raising the risk of wildfires in many regions. Wildfires are uncontrolled or unplanned fires that occur in vegetated areas. Their impacts extend beyond the burned areas, affecting ecosystems, economies and human health. A major health hazard from wildfires is its associated smoke and air pollution. Vulnerability to this exposure is controlled by demographic and socioeconomic factors, thus risk is not distributed evenly within populations. This topic area focuses on measuring population-level exposure to wildfire-related PM2.5 and estimating its short-term impacts on health. This is the Methodology document for indicator: mortality attributable to wildfire-related PM2.5 Version update notice: Updates added to section 2.2 and 6.2 on 30 June 2026, to include latest link and guidance on using the wildfire dataset, as well as an update to the descriptive statistics functionality. Please refer to document version 2.1.

Source: Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research)

DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.14052183

Authors: Jose, Gladin, Ingole, Vijendra, Lewis, Bonang, Glickman, Myer

Institution: Office for National Statistics

Language: English

Topic: Air Quality and Health Impacts

Subfield: Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis

Field: Environmental Science

Domain: Physical Sciences

SDGs: Good health and well-being, Climate action

Open Access status: green

Funder: Wellcome Trust