Characterizing Emission of Particulate Matter from Combusting Different Products of Mosquito Coils in Southern Sierra Leone - Abstract
The use of biomass produced mosquito repellants would continue to remain one of the intervention measures in the foreseeable future to prevent malaria which remains one of the biggest killers in sub-Saharan Africa. Burning these products in homes with little ventilation may result in harmful levels of particulate matter in the indoor micro environment. PM2.5 and PM10 are well known and important pollution indicators that hinder human health and they are usually released during the burning of mosquito coils. To gain insight into the levels and distribution of these indicators, a realtime study on the emission of PM2.5 and PM10 among seven different products of mosquito coils combusted in the outskirt of Bo in southern Sierra Leone was carried out for two weeks. Results indicated that greater fraction of particulate matter was in the PM10 mode comprising 62%-73% for all the products. In most cases the difference between PM2.5 and PM10 were considerable. Premium and Djimba products were noted to be high emitters of PM2.5 and PM10 but Wanmali product was recorded to be the least emitter. Few products showed good agreement between PM2.5 and PM10 linear regression model fit and the PM2.5/PM10 ratio was noted to be consistent in values for most products except one. Our results support the view that the use of inexpensive devices to monitor household air pollution in developing countries is plausible.