Exploring the Potential Relationship Between Global Greenness and DALY Loss Due to Depressive Disorders

Aji Kusumaning Asri; Hui-Ju Tsai; Wen-Chi Pan; Yue Leon Guo; Chia-Pin Yu; Chi-Shin Wu; Huey-Jen Su; Shih-Chun Candice Lung; Chih-Da Wu; John D Spengler

doi:10.3389/fpsyt.2022.919892

Exploring the Potential Relationship Between Global Greenness and DALY Loss Due to Depressive Disorders

Front Psychiatry. 2022 Jun 28:13:919892. doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2022.919892. eCollection 2022.

Authors

Aji Kusumaning Asri¹, Hui-Ju Tsai², Wen-Chi Pan³, Yue Leon Guo^{4

5}, Chia-Pin Yu⁶, Chi-Shin Wu⁷, Huey-Jen Su⁸, Shih-Chun Candice Lung^{9

10

11}, Chih-Da Wu^{1

5}, John D Spengler¹²

Affiliations

¹ Department of Geomatics, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
² Institute of Population Health Sciences, National Health Research Institutes, Miaoli, Taiwan.
³ Institute of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences, National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁴ Department of Environmental and Occupational Medicine, National Taiwan University (NTU) and NTU Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁵ National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, National Health Research Institutes, Miaoli, Taiwan.
⁶ School of Forestry and Resource Conservation, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁷ Department of Psychiatry, National Taiwan University Hospital, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
⁸ Department of Environmental and Occupational Health, National Cheng Kung University, Tainan, Taiwan.
⁹ Research Center for Environmental Changes, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
¹⁰ Department of Atmospheric Sciences, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
¹¹ Institute of Environmental Health, School of Public Health, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan.
¹² Department of Environmental Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Boston, MA, United States.

Abstract

Objective: Prior studies have shown that greenness can reduce the burden of depressive disorders. However, most were focused on local-scale analyses while limited evaluated globally. We aimed to investigate the association between greenness and the burden of depressive disorders using data from 183 countries worldwide.

Methods: We used the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) to estimate greenness. Country-level disability-adjusted life year (DALY) loss due to depressive disorders was used to represent depressive disorder burdens. A generalized linear mixed model was applied to assess the relationship between greenness and depressive disorders after controlling for covariates. Stratified analyses were conducted to determine the effects of greenness across several socio-demographic levels.

Results: The findings showed a significant negative association between greenness and the health burden of depressive disorders with a coefficient of -0.196 (95% CI: -0.356, -0.035) in the DALY changes per interquartile unit increment of NDVI. The stratified analyses suggested beneficial effects of greenness on depressive disorders across sex, various age groups especially for those aged <49 years, with low-income and/or those living in highly urbanized countries.

Conclusions: Our study noted that greenness exposure was significant negative association with the burden of depressive disorders. The findings should be viewed as recommendations for relevant authorities in supporting environmental greenness enhancement to reduce the mental burdens.

Keywords: DALY loss; country-level; depressive disorders; global analysis; greenness.