KICK-OFF MEETING MED-PARTICLES, Rome, Department of Epidemiology, Lazio Regional Health Service,
October 3rd, 9.00 – 16.30
MINUTES
PARTICIPANTS: Ester Alessandrini, Patrizia Compagnucci, Marina Davoli, Daniela D’Ippoliti, Annunziata
Faustini, Francesco Forastiere, Paola Michelozzi, Massimo Stafoggia (ASL-RME); Giovanna Berti, Ennio
Cadum, Stefania Franco, Martina Gandini (ARPAP); Klea Katsouyanni, Evi Samoli (NKUA); Benedicte
Jacquemin, Bart Ostro (CREAL); Maria Catrambone, Cinzia Perrino (CNR-IIA); Silvia Ferrari, Vanes Poluzzi,
Andrea Ranzi (ARPA-ER); Marie-Laure Bidondo (ENVS); Angeliki Karanasiou, Jorge Pey, Xavier Querol,
Aurelio Tobias (CSIC); Gian Paolo Gobbi (ISAC-CNR)
Overview of the project
M. Stafoggia presents the general structure and timeline of MED-PARTICLES, with special attention to the
deliverables and milestones. Several observations are made and decisions taken:
 An internal “unofficial” deadline will be defined to speed up activities aimed at producing data and
results on PM2.5, PM10, PM2.5-10 and health outcomes;
 Each partner has to identify institutions which could be interested in the activities of MED-PARTICLES, as
stakeholders or members of related projects. In the next few days ASL-RME will circulate an excel file to
be filled in with these referents;
 Three people have been identified as possible external advisors from other European countries not
involved in the project: Annette Peters (Germany); Richard Atkinson (UK); Bertil Forsberg (Sweden);
They will be contacted;
 4 thematic groups were defined: Saharan dust (lead: CSIC); Forest fires (lead: ASL-RME); PM
components (lead: CREAL); statistical group (lead: NKUA – ASL-RME). A mail will be circulated in the next
days to identify participants to these groups;
 The issue of publication rules has been introduced: each participant is allowed to use data from its own
country or city outside the MED-PARTICLES project. Of course, a sensitive judgment should be made on
whether preliminary/local results should be published before the overall MED-PARTICLES results.
However, data from other countries can be used only within MED-PARTICLES project and only in
publications and studies agreed in advance.
Health and environmental data for Italy
E. Cadum introduces his group and gives an overview of what data are available from Italy (within the new
EPIAIR project) regarding: daily concentrations of main pollutants (PM10, PM2.5, gases), meteorological
parameters, mortality and hospitalizations counts. Since EPIAIR is also collecting data about PM
compositions in 4 cities (not daily, only on a campaign basis), it is suggested that ARPAP provides details on
these campaigns in the next weeks.
Health and environmental data for Emilia Romagna (Italy)
V. Poluzzi gives an overview of the Supersite project in Emilia Romagna, and specifies that data on PM
components (daily) will be available from November 2011. It is proposed that at least one year of data
(2012) on PM components from the Supersite will be used for the description of PM components across the
Mediterraneum (Action 8).
A. Ranzi shows health data and air pollutant daily concentrations data available for Emilia Romagna
Monitoring campaigns of PM components in Rome
C. Perrino illustrates data from the two monitoring campaigns in Rome: Montelibretti and Villa Ada.
Samples from Villa Ada should be processed. Since data from Montelibretti are more extensive, she
proposed to evaluate the correlation between the two series and Montelibretti data be used to predict
data at Villa Ada when they are not available.
Health, environmental data and PM components for Greece
E.Samoli gives an overview of the data available for Athens and Thessaloniki, Greece
Health and Environmental Data for Spain
B. Ostro gives an overview of the data available for Spain. He also addresses the issue of the minimum
number of years for a city to be included in MED-P. He suggests to collect health and environmental data
for all the cities for which at least one year of data on PM components are available. It is objected that the
request of health data for too many cities could excessively prolong the retrieval times. It is suggested also
that different cities can be included in different analyses and actions, depending of the availability of
different kinds of data.
In addition, since the PM components data are available 1 out of 3 days, it is suggested to foresee a
protocol for imputation of missing values.
Wildfire smoke and human health effects in Europe
D. D’Ippoliti presents some background on forest fires data and health effects in Europe from the PHASE
project.
Methodological issues in the analysis of PM-mortality
E. Samoli provides an overview of statistical methods and challenges in the study of the association
between PM2.5 and mortality. It is discussed the strategy to analyze data: centralizing the analysis within
one center versus doing each center the analyses of its own data. It is decided to centralize the analysis,
however a statistical working group, led by E. Samoli and M. Stafoggia, is set up to define the analytical
protocols for data analysis. This protocol will be circulated among all Med-Particles participants.
Geographical comparison and health effects of PM components
B. Ostro shows some results from Barcelona regarding the health effects of specific PM components.
IDAEA-CSIC contribution to the MED-PARTICLES project
J. Pey shows some results of methodologies applied by CSIC-IDAEA to study PM trends in relation to
atmospheric patterns, Saharan dust and forest fires.
X. Querol suggests a possible structure for a report on PM trends in different locations of Med area.
Administrative and financial aspects
P. Compagnucci highlights some administrative aspects to be taken into account. It is suggested that each
center sends to ASL-RME questions and doubts to be forwarded to MED-PARTICLES tutor.
The next meeting is scheduled in June 2012, date and location to be decided.