BENGALURU, India (AP) — Most of the world has dirty air, with just 17 per cent of cities globally meeting air pollution guidelines, a report Tuesday found.
Switzerland-based air quality monitoring database IQAir analyzed data from 40,000 air quality monitoring stations in 138 countries and found that Chad, Congo, Bangladesh, Pakistan and India had the dirtiest air. India had six of the nine most polluted cities with the industrial town of Byrnihat in northeastern India the worst.
Experts said the real amount of air pollution might be far greater as many parts of the world lack the monitoring needed for more accurate data. In Africa, for example, there is only one monitoring station for every 3.7 million people.
More air quality monitors are being installed to address the problem, the report said. This year, report authors successfully incorporated data from 8,954 new locations and approximately one thousand new monitors as a result of efforts to better monitor air pollution.
But last week, data monitoring for air pollution was dealt a blow when the U.S. State Department announced it would no longer make public its data from its embassies and consulates around the world.
Breathing in polluted air over a long period of time can cause respiratory illness, Alzheimer’s disease and cancer, said Fatimah Ahamad, chief scientist and air pollution expert at Malaysia-based Sunway Centre for Planetary Health. The World Health Organization estimates that air pollution kills around 7 million people each year.
Ahamad said much more needs to be done to reduce air pollution levels. The WHO previously discovered that 99 per cent of the world’s population lives in places that fail to meet recommended air quality levels.
Several cities like Beijing, Seoul, South Korea, and Rybnik in Poland have effectively enhanced their air quality through stricter regulations on pollution from vehicles, power plants and industries. They’ve also advocated cleaner energy and invested in public transportation.
Another notable effort to mitigate severe air pollution was the Association of Southeast Asian Nations agreement on transboundary haze pollution. Despite having achieved limited success so far, ten countries in the region pledged to collaborate in monitoring and reducing pollution from large forest fires, which frequently happen during dry seasons.
Shweta Narayan, a campaign lead at the Global Climate and Health Alliance, said many of the regions witnessing the worst air pollution are also places where planet-heating gases are released extensively through the burning of coal, oil and gas. Slashing planet-warming emissions to slow the heating up of the planet can also improve air quality, she said.
Air pollution and climate crisis “are two sides of the same coin,” she said.
