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. 2022 Jul 6;21(1):62.
doi: 10.1186/s12940-022-00872-w.

The health impacts of Indonesian peatland fires

Lars Hein  1 , Joseph V Spadaro  2 , Bart Ostro  3 , Melanie Hammer  4   5 , Elham Sumarga  6 , Resti Salmayenti  7 , Rizaldi Boer  8 , Hesti Tata  9 , Dwi Atmoko  10 , Juan-Pablo Castañeda  11
Affiliations

The health impacts of Indonesian peatland fires

Lars Hein et al. Environ Health. .

Abstract

Background: Indonesian peatlands have been drained for agricultural development for several decades. This development has made a major contribution to economic development. At the same time, peatland drainage is causing significant air pollution resulting from peatland fires. Peatland fires occur every year, even though their extent is much larger in dry (El Niño) years. We examine the health effects of long-term exposure to fine particles (PM2.5) from all types of peatland fires (including the burning of above and below ground biomass) in Sumatra and Kalimantan, where most peatland fires in Indonesia take place.

Methods: We derive PM2.5 concentrations from satellite imagery calibrated and validated with Indonesian Government data on air pollution, and link increases in these concentrations to peatland fires, as observed in satellite imagery. Subsequently, we apply available epidemiological studies to relate PM2.5 exposure to a range of health outcomes. The model utilizes the age distribution and disease prevalence of the impacted population.

Results: We find that PM2.5 air pollution from peatland fires, causes, on average, around 33,100 adults and 2900 infants to die prematurely each year from air pollution. In addition, peatland fires cause on average around 4390 additional hospitalizations related to respiratory diseases, 635,000 severe cases of asthma in children, and 8.9 million lost workdays. The majority of these impacts occur in Sumatra because of its much higher population density compared to Kalimantan. A main source of uncertainty is in the Concentration Response Functions (CRFs) that we use, with different CRFs leading to annual premature adult mortality ranging from 19,900 to 64,800 deaths. Currently, the population of both regions is relatively young. With aging of the population over time, vulnerabilities to air pollution and health effects from peatland fires will increase.

Conclusions: Peatland fire health impacts provide a further argument to combat fires in peatlands, and gradually transition to peatland management models that do not require drainage and are therefore not prone to fire risks.

Keywords: Health effects; Indonesia; Peatland fires.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Land cover of peatlands in Sumatra (left) and Kalimantan (right) in 2015. Land cover is from the Ministry of Environment and Forestry [15] and peat extent is from the Ministry of Agriculture [14]
Fig. 2
Fig. 2
The 2013–2017 average PM2.5 concentrations for (A) August-Oct (core fire season) and (B) all other months for Sumatra and Kalimantan
Fig. 3
Fig. 3
Monthly averaged population-weighted PM2.5 concentrations (μg/m3) over a five-year period from 2013 to 2017 across the islands of Sumatra and Kalimantan
Fig. 4
Fig. 4
Health impacts of Indonesian peatland fires, based on a CRF curve of [30]
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

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