Exposure assessment methods in studies on waste management and health effects: An overview

Abstract

Concerns and uncertainties persist about potential environmental and health effects associated with exposure to emissions from widely adopted waste management facilities: despite a limited amount of evidence having been found for some exposure-effect associations, most of the available studies were characterized by limitations related to poor exposure assessment, which could introduce biases and weaknesses in the interpretation of results. This communication provides a brief overview of the exposure assessment methods used in studies on waste management and health effects: problems, key issues, priorities and challenges are briefly presented and discussed. The main conclusions refer to the need of newly developed and harmonized exposure assessment strategies and techniques, which represent an essential step in the study of waste-disposal facilities’ health impacts.