WHO Environmental noise guidelines for the European Region - What is new? 1. Policy context and methodology used for guideline development

WHO Regional Office for Europe is currently coordinating the systematic review of all pertinent literature in order to provide recommendations for the protection of public health as part of the upcoming WHO Environmental Noise Guidelines for the European Region (the Guidelines). The entire process is transparent and evidence-based and is...

WHO Environmental Noise Guidelines for the European Region - What is new? 4. Implementation of guidelines and implications for practice

WHO Environmental Noise Guidelines focus on the WHO European Region and provide guidance to its Member States that is compatible with the noise indicators used in the EU Environmental Noise Directive. The Guidelines aim to serve as a reference for several target audiences, such as decision makers and technical experts, health impact assessment...

WHO environmental noise guidelines for the European Region - What is new? 2. New evidence on health effects from environmental noise and implications for research

The Guidelines include systematic reviews of the scientific evidence of the critical health effects of environmental noise: effects on sleep, annoyance, cognitive impairment, cardiovascular diseases, hearing impairment and tinnitus. Other potential health outcomes with less evidence are also systematically reviewed, but have less impact on the...

WHO Environmental noise guidelines for the European Region - What is new? Guideline recommendations and supporting evidence - What is new?

The Guidelines will include recommendations on transportation noise (air, road, rail), leisure noise and wind turbine noise, focusing on the exposure-response functions for the assessment of health impacts, and/or noise exposure levels above which there is an increased risk of adverse health effects. They will also include a recommendation of...

WHO environmental noise guidelines for the European Region

WHO published the Guidelines for Community Noise in 1999 and the Night Noise Guidelines for Europe in 2009. Significant new research in the area of environmental noise and health has taken place since then. As well, new noise sources of concern for public health, such as personal electronic devices and wind turbines, were not addressed in...

Auditory and non-auditory effects of noise on health

Noise is pervasive in everyday life and can cause both auditory and non-auditory health eff ects. Noise-induced hearing loss remains highly prevalent in occupational settings, and is increasingly caused by social noise exposure (eg, through personal music players). Our understanding of molecular mechanisms involved in noise-induced haircell and...

Auditory and non-auditory effects of noise on health

Noise is pervasive in everyday life and can cause both auditory and non-auditory health eff ects. Noise-induced hearing loss remains highly prevalent in occupational settings, and is increasingly caused by social noise exposure (eg, through personal music players). Our understanding of molecular mechanisms involved in noise-induced haircell and...

The role of annoyance in the relation between transportation noise and children's health and cognition

On the basis of this study it cannot be ruled out that the appraisal of the noise affects the association between air and road traffic noise exposure and children's health and cognition. However, the conclusion is limited due to the relatively small group of annoyed children, which may have influenced our group comparisons. Furthermore, the...

Neurobehavioral effects of transportation noise in primary schoolchildren A cross-sectional study

Background. Due to shortcomings in the design, no source-specific exposure-effect relations are as yet available describing the effects of noise on children's cognitive performance. This paper reports on a study investigating the effects of aircraft and road traffic noise exposure on the cognitive performance of primary schoolchildren in both...