Breathing Diseases And Intra-Urban Climate

The main objective of this work was the investigation of possible influences of the urban heat islands in the increase of breathing diseases in children up to four years. The study area was the city of Vitória da Conquista, located in the Southwest of Bahia, Brazil, in the which, historically, the incidence of this kind of disease is the largest in the state and in the country of Brazil. The methodological procedure used geo-processing techniques for the location of the urban heat islands together with the installation of meteorological stations. The number of cases of breathing diseases in the infantile population was obtained through the analysis of the handbooks of all the hospitals that assisted children in the city. Three heat islands were identified in the central area of the urban area that presented values of relative humidity inferior to 25% when compared with the values of the station located out of the urban area and temperatures of up to 4,1°C superiors. The largest number of children's cases with breathing diseases happened near the heat islands, indicating the increase of the studied disease due to the decrease of the temperature and increase of the relative humidity in these places during the coldest months.