Full-Chain Health Impact Assessment of Autonomous Vehicles: A Review of Literature and A Conceptual Framework 

Abstract
Identifying the impacts of AVs is required to govern the unintended negative consequences of this technology. Despite the numerous attempts to recognize and frame the consequences of AV implementation, the discussion around the public health impacts of AVs is still in its infancy, where no study has quantified the health impacts of AVs. This study is designed to address the existing gap in discussions around AVs’ impacts on public health and health equity by proposing a conceptual framework for quantifying the AVs’ health impacts at the system level through the changes in transportation. The manner and extent of changes in transportations rely on the automation level of the vehicles as well as the intent of use. travel demand models can be used for quantifying the extent of changes in the trip, mode and route choice and traffic assignment to the network, as a measure of changes in transportation. Using three pathways, air pollution, physical activity, and motor vehicle crashes, the changes in transportation can be translated into health outcomes. Emission and dispersion models based on the changes in traffic flow, speed and vehicle type are required to estimate the air quality for each scenario. The analysis of the potential shifts from active transport to other modes identifies the changes in physical activity for each AV scenario. The AVs’ impact on motor vehicle crashes can be captured by incorporating the changes in traffic flow and AVs’ safety functions regarding the level of automation. Employing a standard burden of disease assessment methodology, the health outcomes—e.g. mortality, morbidity, and injury—associated with each pathway can be quantified at the desired spatial level. To explore the impacts of AVs on health equity the health outcomes of AVs implementations can be stratified based on socioeconomic, socio-demographic and geographic factors. The proposed framework aims to provide researchers with (1) a practical mechanism to demonstrate AVs’ health impacts which can be used as a research agenda for future studies, (2) a review of state of art methods required for quantifying the AVs impacts, (3) a stop knowledge source for future and continuing research, and (4) a full-chain health impacts assessment framework for quantifying the health impacts of AVs at the system level. Quantifying the health impacts of AVs could be used for making more informed decisions about the AVs supporting policies, increasing the public awareness of health impacts of AVs, and incentivizing the health sectors to intervene and contribute to policymaking and investments regarding AVs. The results of such an analysis can also be used to uncover the uncertainties in AVs’ harms or benefits.