An Air Quality Health Index (AQHI) with Different Health Outcomes Based on the Air Pollution Concentrations in Stockholm during the Period of 2015–2017

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

In this manuscript, NO2, O3 and PM10 concentrations from 2015 to 2017 were used to calculate AQHI, then the correlations between AQHI and healthy outcome was statistically analyzed. The manuscript is well organized and the analysis is reasonable, but all the figures are of very low quality. I have three concerns, the first one is that PM2.5 is proved to be more related to health problems in many studies, not including PM2.5 in the AQHI weakens the findings/conclusions in this study; The second is that is there strong correlation between AQHI with the different health outcomes? If there are no strong correlations, I am not sure if the AQHI is meaningful.

Comments:

Line 84-85: The p and i in eq.1 were not explained.

Line 84-85: Is the concentration of Xi data daily or hourly concentration? Is the O3 data 8-h O3, 3h O3 or 1h O3?

In the Results, the author should provide a summary of the concentrations of the pollutants.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer!

See the answers in the attached file.

Best regards,

Henrik

Reviewer 2 Report

This paper is an expansion of work previously reported in 

Olstrup, H.; Johansson, C.; Forsberg, B.; Tornevi, A.; Ekebom, A.; Meister, K. A Multi-Pollutant Air Quality
273 Health Index (AQHI) Based on Short-Term Respiratory Effects in Stockholm, Sweden. Int. J. Environ. Res.
274 Public Health, 2019, 16, 105.

which is reference number 7 in the paper.  I have read the earlier paper and find that this work contains significant new results, especially in that this paper includes mortality impacts and not just asthma-related hospital admissions; age is also taken into consideration here. 

The tables and figures are appropriate and not excessive in size or  number; the paper is well written and the author exceptionally well qualified. 

One possible area of concern is the inclusion of pollen count as a variable in the earlier paper's analysis but not in this analysis.  The discussion section examines how this issue was dealt with at some length in a satisfactory manner.   

I would appreciate it if the author would include graphs of the time series of the pollutants as supplemental information. 

I found this paper to be of value in my current research activities.

Author Response

Dear Reviewer!

See my answers in the attached file.

Best regards,

Henrik

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The manuscript has been revised and improved. I recommend to accept it for publication.

Author Response

Thank you very much for your review.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf