Disease Burden of Urban Air Pollution

The greatest environmental health risk around the globe isn't toxic waste, oil spills, nuclear radiation, heavy metals in drinking water or vector-borne diseases, such as malaria. It's the air in our cities and homes, according to a 2012 World Health Organization study. Diseases including acute lower respiratory disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, strokes, lung cancer and ischemic heart disease that can be attributed to ambient air pollution and household air pollution exposure cause an astonishingly high number of premature deaths each year, the 2012 estimate is about 8 million deaths per year. Many of these deaths are the result of multiple risk factors, both smoking and inhabiting a city with a high concentration of air pollutants can result in lung cancer. Studies finished in 2013 by WHO show that air pollution, indicated by small particulate matter between 10 and 2.5 microns (PM10 and PM2.5), can be carcinogenic.

The presence of PM10 and PM2.5 is the result of poor environmental policy at the municipal, national and international level in most of the world. Industry, transportation, power generation and waste management are the primary perpetuators of PM10 and PM2.5 generation and can all be found occurring at high rates in the world's growing urban areas. Other pollutants of concern include ozone (harmful to asthmatics), as well as nitrogen oxide and sulfur dioxide (the primary causes of acid rain). Indoor smoke exposure resulting from cooking by burning solid biomass puts about 3 billion people at risk of disease, the majority of which are women.

The World Health Organization maintains international standards for acceptable levels of ambient air pollution, however there is no strong compliance enforcement mechanism in place. Of the 1600 cities that report their air quality to WHO, only 12 percent have levels of pollution deemed acceptable. Gaps in monitoring exist in cities that lack the capacity to do so. Most of these cities are located in the Eastern Mediterranean  region and Africa, although the US does not report its air quality information to WHO despite having extensive monitoring programs in place. Individual cities within the US publish their own air quality data, which can be easily compared to other reporting regions of the world in this graphic.

There certainly appears to distinct difference between regions of the world in terms of air quality. I think it is important to reflect on how much of the world's industry and manufacturing occurs in cities around the world that don't have environmental policies in place that are as strong as the US and EU. Decreasing emissions of pollutants and increasing energy-use efficiency can be expensive, and while many business owners and corporations in the US bemoan the environmental regulations they operate under, I certainly appreciate having cleaner air as a result of policy. I say that with a twinge of guilt, knowing that much of what I own was manufactured somewhere near one of those red dots on the map, and that the pollution that resulted from my possessions was passed on to someone else, in another part of the world.

Here is a link to an interactive graphic produced by the WHO showing which regions and nations have exceptionally high levels of air pollution, and shows how many nations don't report data at all:

http://gamapserver.who.int/gho/interactive_charts/phe/oap_exposure/atlas.html

*All information for this post was gathered WHO's "Public health, environmental and social determinants of health" webpage or my previous coursework