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Background: Ground-level ozone (O3) pollution is currently the one of the severe environmental problems in China. Although existing studies have quantified the O3-related health impact and economic loss, few have focused on the acute health effects of short-term exposure to O3 and have been limited to a single temporal and spatial dimension.Methods: Based on the O3 concentration obtained from ground monitoring networks in 334 Chinese cities in 2015-2018, this study used a two-stage exposure parameter weighted Log-linear exposure-response function to estimate the cause-specific mortality for short-term exposure to O3.Results: The value of statistical life (VSL) method that were used to calculate the economic loss at the city-level. Our results show that in China, the national all-cause mortality attributed to O3 was 0.27(95% CI: 0.14-0.55) to 0.39 (95% CI: 0.20-0.67) million across 2015-2018. The estimated economic loss caused by O3 was 387.76 (95% CI: 195.99-904.50) to 594.08 (95% CI: 303.34-1140.65) billion CNY, accounting for 0.52 to 0.69% of total reported GDP. Overall, the O3 attributed health and economic burden has begun to decline in China since 2017. However, highly polluted areas still face severe burden, and undeveloped areas suffer from high GDP losses.Conclusions: There are substantial health impacts and economic losses related to short-term O3 exposure in China. The government should pay attention to the emerging ozone pollution, and continue to strengthen the intervention in traditional priority areas while solving the pollution problem in non-priority areas. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing studies focused on the evaluation of health burden of long-term exposure to air pollutants, whereas limited information is available on short-term exposure, particularly in China. Air pollutant concentrations in 338 Chinese cities in 2017 were used to estimate the air pollutants related health burden which was defined as premature mortalities from all-cause, cardiovascular and respiratory disease as well as hospital admissions for cardiovascular and respiratory disease. Log-linear model was used as the exposure-response function to estimate the health burden attributable to each air pollutant. The value of statistical life and cost of illness methods were used to estimate economic loss of the premature mortalities and hospital admissions, respectively. The national all-cause premature mortalities attributable to all air pollutants was 1.35 million, accounting for 17.2% of reported deaths in China in 2017. Among all-cause premature mortality, contributions of PM 2.5 , PM 2.5-10 , NO 2 , SO 2 , O 3 and CO were11.1%, 5.2%, 28.9%, 9.6%, 23.0%, and 22.2%, respectively. The national cardiovascular and respiratory premature mortalities were 0.77 and 0.21 million, respectively. About 7.8 million cardiovascular and respiratory disease hospital admissions were attributed to short-term exposure to all air pollutants. The economic loss of the overall health burden (premature mortality and hospital admissions) was 2065.54 billion Yuan, which was equivalent to 2.5% of the national GDP in 2017. The health burden and economic loss attributable to short-term exposure to ambient air pollutant are substantial in China. It suggested that the adverse health effects attributable to short-term exposure to air pollutant should not be neglected in China. In order to reduce the health impact of air pollution, each city should develop air pollution prevention and control measures based on existing scientific evidence. • The mortalities and hospital admissions attributable to short-term exposure to six air pollutants were estimated in China. • The national all-cause premature mortality attributable to all air pollutants was 1.35 million. • About 7.8 million hospital admissions were attributed to short-term exposure to air pollutants. • The economic loss of the overall health burden was 2065.54 billion Yuan, accounting for 2.5% of the national GDP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]