According to new data from the Air Quality Index (AQLI), while global pollution will increase slightly in 2021, its burden on human health will also increase. If the world could permanently reduce fine particle pollution (PM2.5) to meet World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines, life expectancy would increase by 2.3 years on average. , which equates to a total of 17.8 billion years of life expectancy saved worldwide.
These data clearly show that particulate pollution remains the largest external risk to human health in the world, with an impact on life expectancy comparable to that of smoking, three times greater. compared with unsafe alcohol and water consumption, and more than five times. than traffic accidents. such as a car accident, the report said.
However, the global pollution challenge is very uneven. “Three-quarters of the impact of air pollution on life expectancy worldwide occurs in just six countries, Bangladesh, India, Pakistan, China, Nigeria and Indonesia, where people lose between one and more six years of life because of the air they breathe. ” said Michael Greenstone, professor emeritus of economics at Milton Friedman and the creator of the AQLI with colleagues from the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago (EPIC).
“For the last five years, the AQLI’s local information on air quality and its health consequences has generated substantial media and political coverage, but there is an opportunity to complement this annual information with more frequent—for example, daily—and locally generated data.”
Indeed, many polluted countries lack basic air pollution infrastructure. Asia and Africa are the two most poignant examples. They contribute 92.7 percent of life years lost due to pollution. Yet, just 6.8 and 3.7 percent of governments in Asia and Africa, respectively, provide their citizens with fully open air quality data. Further, just 35.6 and 4.9 percent of countries in Asia and Africa, respectively, have air quality standards—the most basic building block for policies.
The collective current investments in global air quality infrastructure also do not match where air pollution is having its greatest toll on human life. While there is a large global fund for HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis that annually disburses $4bn toward the issues, there is no equivalent set of coordinated resources for air pollution.
In fact, the entire continent of Africa receives under $300,000 in philanthropic funds toward air pollution (i.e. the current average price of a single-family home in the United States). Just $1.4m goes to Asia, outside of China and India. Europe, the United States, and Canada, meanwhile, receive $34m, according to the Clean Air Fund.
“Timely, reliable, open air quality data in particular can be the backbone of civil society and government clean air efforts—providing the information that people and governments lack and that allows for more informed policy decisions,” says Christa Hasenkopf, the director of AQLI and air quality programs at EPIC. “Fortunately, we see an immense opportunity to play a role in reversing this by better targeting—and increasing—our funding dollars to collaboratively build the infrastructure that is missing today.”
South Asia
In no other location on the planet is the deadly impact of pollution more visible than in South Asia, home to the four most polluted countries in the world and nearly a quarter of the global population. In Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan, the AQLI data reveal that residents are expected to lose about five years off their lives on average if the current high levels of pollution persist, and more in the most polluted regions—accounting for more than half of the total life years lost globally due to pollution.
Nepal
The study has shown that Nepal is the world’s third most polluted country based on satellite-derived PM2.5 data. Fine particulate air pollution (PM2.5) shortens the average Nepali resident’s life expectancy by 4.6 years, relative to what it would be if the World Health Organization (WHO) guideline of 5 µg/m3 was met. Some areas of Nepal fare much worse than average, with air pollution shortening lives by 6.8 years in the nine districts with the highest concentration of particulate pollution, according to the study. These districts lie in southern Nepal and share their borders with the highly-polluted Northern Plains of India, the study says.
Asia and Africa bear the greatest burden
Asia and Africa bear the greatest burden yet have some of the weakest infrastructure to deliver citizens timely, accurate data. They also receive tiny slices of an already small global philanthropic pie. For example, the entire continent of Africa receives less than $300,000 to tackle air pollution.
“There is a profound disconnect with where air pollution is the worst and where we, collectively and globally, are deploying resources to fix the problem,” Christa Hasenkopf, director of air quality programs at EPIC.
While there is an international financing partnership called the Global Fund that disburses $4bn annually on HIV/AIDS, malaria and tuberculosis, there is no equivalent for air pollution.
“Yet, air pollution shaves off more years from the average person’s life in the DRC (Democratic Republic of Congo) and Cameroon than HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other health threats,” the report said.
Bangladesh tops ranking
Globally, South Asia is the worst impacted region. Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Pakistan are in order the top four most polluted countries in terms of annualized, population-weighted averages of fine particulate matter, which are detected by satellites and defined as particles with a diameter of 2.5 microns or less (PM2.5).
Air pollution concentrations are then fed into the AQLI metric which calculates their impact on life expectancy, based on peer-reviewed methods. Residents of Bangladesh, where average PM2.5 levels were 74 micrograms per cubic meter, would gain 6.8 years of life if this were brought to WHO guidelines of five micrograms per cubic meter. India’s capital Delhi meanwhile is the “most polluted megacity in the world” with annual average particulate pollution of 126.5 micrograms per cubic meter.
Source: Here