The Potential role of Particulate Matter in the Spreading of COVID-19 in Northern Italy: First Evidence-based Research Hypotheses

Leonardo Setti; Fabrizio Passarini; Gianluigi De Gennaro; Pierluigi Barbieri; Maria Grazia Perrone; Andrea Piazzalunga; Massimo Borelli; Jolanda Palmisani; Alessia Di Gilio; PRISCO PISCITELLI; Alessandro Miani

Besides PM 10 daily limit value exceedances we considered several further covariates related to the different Provinces: population absolute frequencies; population densities (n° inhabitants/km 2 ); the absolute frequencies of people daily travelling as estimated by the Italian National Institute of Statistics [3] , and its proportion with respect to the overall Province population. As response variable we considered the infection rate of the disease, expressed as a proportion obtained binding together into a single two-dimensional vector both the number of COVID-19 cases and the rest of the Province population. We have performed statistical inferences analyses on Milan and Rome data, in order to observe the potential association between PM levels and COVID-19 spreading in big cities located in different geographic areas and with remarkable differences in PM 10 exceedances, presenting at the same time quite similar urbanization, life style, population, ageing index, and number of commuters.