Impacts of environmental control on greenhouse gas emissions–respiratory mortality nexus: evidence from OECD countries

Environmental degradation in general, and the intensification of greenhouse gases (GHG) in particular, have endangered the environment, with adverse consequences for population health. This study aims to explore whether stringent environmental policies mitigate the negative impacts of GHG emissions on respiratory fatalities in a panel of 19 OECD countries over the period 1990–2019.

To achieve this aim, the study applies a panel threshold model to find out the potential differential impacts of emissions under low and high regimes of environmental control on total and child (under 5 years) respiratory mortality.

We find that stringent environmental policies under the high environmental control regime have a significant impact in reducing the adverse effect of GHG emissions on respiratory mortality.

Such a finding implies that authorities have more reason to invest in tackling emissions and adopt more restrictive policies to improve environmental quality, as this helps reduce the adverse health effects of environmental degradation. This is particularly relevant for countries which are currently in a low environmental control regime.