Winds of fire and smoke: Air pollution and health in the Brazilian Amazon.

• Air pollution in the Brazilian Amazon leads to increases in hospitalization rates. • Adverse effects are concentrated in respiratory conditions. • Effects are higher among children and the elderly. • Effects increase non-linearly with air pollution levels. • There are negative externalities related to deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon. In this paper we assess the effects of fire-related air pollution on population health in the Brazilian Amazon. Our empirical strategy is based on a municipality-by-month fixed effects model, coupled with an instrumental variables approach that explores wind direction and air pollution in surrounding areas in order to exogenously shift exposure to air pollution at the locality. We find that exposure to air pollution, measured by PM2.5 concentration levels, is robustly associated with an increase in hospital admissions for respiratory conditions. The effects are higher among children and the elderly, and increase non-linearly with pollution levels. Our benchmark estimates indicate that an increase of one standard deviation in PM2.5 is related to an increase of 1.5% of the monthly hospitalization rate for respiratory conditions. The latter estimate reaches 14% if monthly average PM2.5 crosses thresholds as high as 75 μ g/m3. We do not observe significant effects on hospitalization rates related to other health conditions nor on mortality rates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]