Shanghai: Chronic air pollution cuts average global life expectancy by more than two years per capita, an effect far worse than that of smoking and far worse than HIV/AIDS or terrorism, a study published Tuesday showed. The Energy Policy Institute (EPIC) of the University of Chicago said in its latest Air Quality Life Index that more than 97% of the global population lives in areas where air pollution exceeds recommended levels, which is a satellite measure of PM 2.5 levels. uses data. Dangerous floating particles that damage the lungs.
It said that if global PM2.5 levels as recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) were reduced to five micrograms per cubic metre, the average life expectancy would increase by an average of 2.2 years.
The study warns that while air pollution has been neglected as a public health issue, funding is still insufficient to address the problem.
“Now that our understanding of the impact of pollution has improved, there is a strong case for governments to prioritize this as an urgent policy issue,” said Christa Hasenkoff, director of the EPIC’s Air Quality Life Index.
With residents of South Asia losing an estimated five years of life as a result of smog, India has increased the world’s air pollution by almost 44% since 2013, the study said.
Residents of China could live an average of 2.6 years longer if WHO standards were reached, although life expectancy has improved by almost two years since 2013, when the country began its “war on pollution” that reduced PM 2.5. reduced by about 40%.
The EPIC calculations were based on a previous study showing that continuous exposure to an additional 10 micrograms per cubic meter of PM2.5 would reduce life expectancy by about one year.
Not a single country managed to meet the WHO’s 5-microgram standard in 2021, according to a survey of pollution data published earlier this year.