Breathing is more injurious to health in India than smoking
Globally, people are losing 1.8 life years due to particulate pollution. This is almost equal to the life years lost due to cigarette smoking. Particulate Pollution is caused by the excess of concentration of PM 2.5 in the air. Breathing PM 2.5 regularly can cause severe lung and heart diseases. The World Health Organisation (WHO) […]
Globally, people are losing 1.8 life years due to particulate pollution. This is almost equal to the life years lost due to cigarette smoking. Particulate Pollution is caused by the excess of concentration of PM 2.5 in the air. Breathing PM 2.5 regularly can cause severe lung and heart diseases.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) sets 10 μg/m3 as the safe limit of PM2.5 concentration in the air. India's current PM 2.5 concentration is 5 times the limit set by WHO. This means, on an average Indians are losing 4.3 years of their life expectancy to particulate pollution.
Among the top 20 polluted cities in the world, 16 are in India. The environment health of the country is the worst in the world.
Still, the problem of pollution still does not top the priorities of political parties in this election season.