The prevalence of asthma and severe asthma in children influenced by transportation factors: Evidence from spatial analysis in Seoul, Korea

Although the causes of asthma are inconclusive, it is fairly known that exposure to outdoor air pollutants can cause asthma, especially children's asthma morbidity. Whereas transportation is one of the major sectors that generate air pollutants, previous research that investigates the correlation between transportation and asthma narrowly focuses on the contribution of automobile traffic to children's asthma. Developing three spatial regression models (a spatial lag (SL) model, a spatial error (SE) model, and a general spatial (SAC) model), this paper investigates the roles of a variety of transportation factors in two distinct stages of children's asthma morbidity; asthma and severe asthma. With consideration to asthma-related socio-economic factors in the City of Seoul, the SE (R² = 0.31) and SAC (R² = 0.34) models consistently indicate that three out of four transportation factors associate with children's severe asthma at statistically significant level. They include the negative influence of bus transit and dense intersections, and the positive influence of active transportation activities on children's asthma severity. Interestingly, however, no significant contribution of transportation factors to children's asthma morbidity was identified by the SE (R² = 0.29) and SAC (R² = 0.28) models. Shedding more light on the complexity of children's asthma morbidity and severity, this paper proposes collaborative partnerships not only among multi- dimensional agencies, but also among multi-level government organizations.