Introduction: Iodine deficiency and associated disorders, which lead to a wide range of clinical manifestations, have been raised as one of the health and nutritional problems in Iran. Therefore, this study was aimed to investigate the amount of iodine in distributed salts in Abarkouh city in 2017-2018.
Materials and Methods: Random sampling was done by census on all 30 distributed brands in Abarkouh city in the different stores across the city. Sixty samples (30 samples after one month from the production date and 30 samples after 6 months from the production date) were collected and transferred to the laboratory. The measurement of iodine was done according to the British Pharmacopoeia recommended method. T-test was used to analyze the data.
Results: The Mean iodine concentration in the salts supplied in the Abarkouh was 29.83 ± 19.9 ppm, which was 50% less than the Iran's standard, with a statistically significant difference (P ≤ 0.001). 66.6% of the studied brands did not contain adequate iodine. Six months after production date, the average iodine amount in salts was reduced to 24.26 ± 16.94 ppm, but the reduction was not statistically significant (P = 0.224).
Conclusion: Average iodine amount in most of the salts supplied across the Abarkouh city was not acceptable and some salts lacked iodine. Therefore, careful and continuous supervision and monitoring the process of iodized salts production in factories is recommended.

Introduction: Due to water scarcity and increased water consumption during the past years, the importance of water in terms of transmission of diseases, as well as Iran's climate, groundwater aquifers are known as the most important resources of drinking water supply. Using the Water Quality Index (WQI) is considered as strong managerial tool for decision making in water resource management. Therefore, the aim of this study was to evaluate the quality of groundwater in Ardakan for drinking purpose using WQI. Spatial analysis was conducted with the geographic information system (GIS).
Materials and Methods: This is a descriptive, cross-sectional study to investigate the quality of groundwater in Ardakan for drinking purpose. Information on total dissolved solids (TDS), total hardness, pH, electrical conductivity (EC), bicarbonate (HCO₃^-), chlorine (CL^-), sulfate (SO₄^2-), nitrate (NO₃^-), calcium (Ca²⁺) and magnesium (Mg²⁺) of 24 wells was obtained from Ardakan Health Center. The characteristics of the stations were determined using the Global Positioning System (GPS) and transmitted to the map prepared in the GIS environment. The calculated values of the WQI were zoned in the GIS environment by Inverse Distance Weighted (IDW) method.
Results: Based on the WQI, well no.5 has the best quality water (17.61), which has the lowest WQI, and the highest value of WQI was obtained for well no. 20 (156.86).
Conclusion: The results of the study showed that none of wells have drinkable water, 13 wells had good quality water, and 11 wells had poor quality and should be treated for drinking.

Introduction: Hospitals, as one of the important elements in the health system, play an important role in patient’s health. Fungi are one of the effective parameters on indoor air quality. This study aimed to compare of fungal contamination of two hospitals in Shiraz City.
Materials and Methods: Sampling was conducted based on NIOSH 0800 standard (1.5 meters above the ground level with one stage Anderson and Sabaroud dextrose agar enriched chloramphenicol as the growth media) in January-September 2017. The investigated wards included pathological laboratory, emergency rooms, neonatal specialist care, radiology, operating room, and maternity ward. The results showed that the variation and concentration of fungi were higher in hospital X than hospital Y, which was located in an agricultural area far from the city center.
Results: The predominant fungi were Monillia, Aspergillus, and Penicillium in hospital Y, while they were Aspergillus and Penicillium in hospital X. The highest concentrations were found in emergency and laboratory wards. With regard to higher fungal contamination of hospital X and its different location, it can be concluded that the geographical properties and outdoor air are effective factors on indoor air contamination at hospitals.  
Conclusion: Appropriate management of patients' admission and visiting time can be effective on indoor air contamination at hospitals. Furthermore, efficient ventilation using high-efficiency particulate air and appropriate devices for elimination of fungi level are recommended to this end. Moreover, these parameters can provide physical and psychometric health problems for patients’ careers and other health workers.

Introduction: Current energy sources are coming to end and one of the main priorities of the country’s management is the energy recovery from renewable energy. Considerable quantity of municipal solid waste (MSW) is one of the most serious urban pollution sources. Impact assessment matrix is a new and fast tool for Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA).
Materials and Methods: In this regard, renewable energy like waste-to-energy was investigated. Environmental assessment method was performed to evaluate the environmental impacts of common Waste to Energy (WTE) technologies by Wooten and Rau matrix. Most available WTE technologies (anaerobic digestion, sanitary landfill with gas recovery, waste incineration, and gasification) were environmentally assessed and compared.
Results: Results showed that anaerobic digestion could be most environmental friendly WTE technology for production of renewable energy from organic waste and could be considered. Furthermore, executives as green minded managements can improve the quality of waste management by finding new solutions. Other technologies such as landfill by gas recovery and gasification will be ranked second and third in terms of environmental effect.
Conclusion: Results showed that performing anaerobic digestion technology will produce less environmental impact in long term. Then landfilling by gas recovery and gasification technologies will be ranked second and third in terms of environmental effect.

Introduction: Air pollutants and respiratory diseases have a significant relationship and cause major health problems. Low attention has been paid to the daily hospital admissions due to the presence of pollutants in desert cities such as Yazd city, Iran. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate the short-term relationship between air pollution and daily hospital admissions due to respiratory disease in Yazd hospitals.
Materials and Methods: This cross-sectional study investigated pollutants including PM₁₀, CO, SO₂, NO₂, and O₃ recorded daily in Yazd air pollution monitoring station. Moreover, the daily hospital admissions (sample size =180) of the pulmonary patients were collected from government hospitals from March to September 2017. 
Results: The results showed that PM₁₀ concentrations were higher than the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and World Health Organization standards. Furthermore, only 7.6% of the patients' diseases were attributed to air pollution. The highest correlation (R = 0.595 and P = 0.002) was observed between daily hospital admissions and NO₂ concentration. However, after age adjustment in regression analysis, this relationship was also significant for O₃. The behavior and variations of pollutants were interpreted by time series using auto-regressive moving average (ARMA) (1,1). The results showed that the best correlation was found between pollutants and admission of the patients at lag = 48 hr. 
Conclusion: The daily admission of patients to hospital due to pulmonary disease was highly related to NO₂ and O₃. However, the correlation of admission with CO, PM₁₀, and SO₂ was not significant, because NO₂ and O₃ are oxidation factors and stimulate the respiratory system.

Introduction: Wastewater contains a large number of pathogenic and non-pathogenic microorganisms that can become bioaerosols during the treatment processes in different units of the treatment plant, and pose a risk to workers and nearby residents. In this study, the release of bioaerosols from a wastewater treatment plant of Morche Khort Industrial Town was investigated.
Materials and Methods: Sampling was actively performed according to EPA standard, in two seasons of spring and summer in 2018-2019, by an environmental sampling pump with a flow rate of 15 l/min and a single-stage impactor. The data were analyzed by SPSS software version 2020.
Results: The study results showed that the mean number of bacteria in the aeration tank was significantly higher than other points. The mean number of fungi in the aeration pond with 144 CFU/m³ had the highest concentration, and no fungal bioaerosol was observed 500 m downstream. Regarding the emission of H₂S, CH₄, and VOC gases, the anaerobic tank had the highest emission of these gases.
Conclusion: Wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) with activated sludge treatment technology and an aeration system can lead to an increase in the concentration of bacterial and fungal aerosols around the units and in surrounding areas.