There are two indicators within Population Burden: Exposure, and Socioeconomic. Within Population Characteristics, there exist two indicators: Sensitive, Environmental Effects. Each respective indicator contains several relevant covariates, and an averaged score.
The two "Pollution Burden" average scores are then averaged together and the result is multiplied by the average of the "Population Characteristics" categories to get the total EJ Score for each tract.
For each indicator, the percentile is given. For example, the indicator value for "Asthma Emergency Discharges" with 0.9 is therefore in the 90th percentile, which means only 10% of tracts in Maryland have higher values. EJ Scores near 1 represent areas of the greatest environmental justice concern.
A study of Bladensburg, MD - located in Prince George’s County - demonstrated the application of the MD EJSCREEN (Driver et al., 2019). According to the study, The Bladensburg population is composed of 20.1% of the community members living below the federal poverty line. Through an analysis, leveraging the Maryland EJSCREEN, Bladensburg with MD EJSCREEN, the researchers found that Bladensburg has an EJ score higher than 99% of the census tracts in Prince George’s County, indicating a higher prevalence of environmental hazards in the region.
Furthermore, it was determined that Bladensburg residents are at a higher risk of developing cancer due to air pollution than 90–100% of the census tracts in the state or county.
Driver, A.; Mehdizadeh, C.; Bara-Garcia, S.; Bodenreider, C.; Lewis, J.; Wilson, S. Utilization of the Maryland Environmental Justice Screening Tool: A Bladensburg, Maryland Case Study. Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2019, 16, 348.
