WHO Indoor Air Quality Guidelines

Almost 3 billion people, in low- and middle-income countries mostly, still rely on solid fuels (wood, animal dung, charcoal, crop wastes and coal) burned in inefficient and highly polluting stoves for cooking and heating. In 2012 alone, no fewer than 4.3 million children and adults died prematurely from illnesses caused by such household air pollution, according to estimates by the World Health Organization.

Together with widespread use of kerosene stoves, heaters and lamps, these practices also result in many serious injuries and deaths from scalds, burns and poisoning.

These new indoor air quality guidelines for household fuel combustion aim to help public health policy-makers, as well as specialists working on energy, environmental and other issues understand best approaches to reducing household air pollution -- the greatest environmental health risk in the world today.

Contents

• Foreword
• Glossary
• Acknowledgements
• Executive summary
• 1. Introduction
  • 1.1 The health burden from household fuel combustion
  • 1.2 Scoping questions
  • 1.3 WHO guidelines relating to this topic
  • 1.4 Target audience
• 2. Guideline development process
  • 2.1 Scope of the guidelines
  • 2.2 Evidence review
  • 2.3 From evidence to recommendations
• 3. Individuals and partners involved in the development of these guidelines
  • 3.1 WHO steering group (SG)
  • 3.2 Guideline development group (GDG)
  • 3.3 External peer-review group (EPRG)
  • 3.4 Management of conflicts of interest
• 4. Recommendations
  • 4.1 Focus of recommendations
  • 4.2 General considerations
  • 4.3 Recommendation 1: Emission rate targets
  • 4.4 Recommendation 2: Policy during transition to technologies and fuels that meet WHO air quality guidelines
  • 4.5 Recommendation 3: Household use of coal
  • 4.6 Recommendation 4: Household use of kerosene (paraffin)
  • 4.7 Good practice recommendation: securing health and climate co-benefits
• 5. Implementation of the guidelines
  • 5.1 Introduction
  • 5.2 Approach to implementation: collaboration and the role of the health sector
  • 5.3 Needs assessment
  • 5.4 Intervention options and strategies
  • 5.5 Policy for effective and sustained adoption
  • 5.6 Standards, testing and regulation
  • 5.7 Monitoring and evaluation: assessing the impact of these guidelines
  • 5.8 Research needs
• 6. Updating the guidelines
  • 6.1 Web-based updates
  • 6.2 Updates based on substantial new evidence
• References
• Annex 1 Steering, advisory and external review groups
• Annex 2 Summary of conflict of interest (COI) management
• Annex 3 Summary of evidence reviews
• Annex 4 Recommendation 1 – Emission rate targets: assessment of the quality of the evidence and strength of the recommendation
• Annex 5 Recommendation 2 – Policy during transition: assessment of the quality of the evidence and the strength of the recommendation
• Annex 6 Recommendation 3 – Household use of coal: assessment of the quality of the evidence and setting the strength of the recommendation
• Annex 7 Recommendation 4 – household use of kerosene: assessment of the quality of the evidence and setting of the strength of the recommendation
• Annex 8 Policy considerations for the best-practice recommendation on climate co-benefits
• Annex 9 International standards and testing facilities

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