Seasonal effects of temperature fluctuations on air quality and respiratory disease: a study in Beijing

The decrease and increase in temperature between neighboring days will have obvious influence on air quality and public health. Based on generalized additive model, this paper aims to examine the seasonal effects of temperature fluctuations on air quality index (AQI) and respiratory disease (RD) during 2008–2012 in Beijing. The results show that the impact of decrease and increase in temperature on AQI and RD varies in different seasons. A large decrease in temperature results in the increase in AQI and RD only in the cold season. At the same time, compared with cold season, larger increased effects of small increase in temperature are observed on AQI and RD in warm season. For a large increase in temperature, a larger impact on AQI is observed in the warm season compared with cold season, while a larger impact on RD is observed in the cold season contrarily. Furthermore, extremely large decrease in temperature (>7 °C) results in the similar impact on AQI in the warm and cold season. Extremely large increase in temperature (>7 °C) has the similar influence on AQI and RD for both warm and cold season. Compared with small and large increase in temperature, extremely large increase in temperature (>7 °C) results in the largest influence on AQI and RD. Our results suggest that the air quality and public health in Beijing are significantly influenced by decrease and increase in temperature in different seasons.