Air pollution led to over 5.5 million premature deaths in 2013: Scientists

Air pollution caused more than 5.5 million premature deaths in 2013 in the world, according to research.

Quoting the research findings, presented on Friday, British newspaper The Guardian in a report said that more than half of the deaths happened in India and China and illnesses in those countries would certainly rise.

According to scientists from the US, Canada, China and India, who presented their findings at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Washington, conditions caused by air pollution killed 1.6 million people in China and 1.4 million people in India in 2013.

“Air pollution is the fourth-highest risk factor for death globally and by far the leading environmental risk factor for disease,” The Guardian quoted Michael Brauer, a researcher from the University of British Columbia, as saying.

According to Brauer, air pollution contributes to heart disease, stroke, lung cancer, bronchitis, emphysema and acute infections.

He and his colleagues compared the problem in Asia to the conditions under centuries of industrial revolution in the US and Europe: massive economic growth smothered by clouds of toxic matter in the air, the Guardian said.

Coal pollution alone killed 366,000 people in China in 2013, according to researcher Qiao Ma.

She said coal burned for electricity was the largest polluter in the country, and that China’s new targets to reduce emissions, agreed at the Paris climate talks last year, do not go far enough.

Researcher Chanda Venkataraman attributed the India’s high air pollution to coal, wood and dung fires, which send enormous amounts of ash and toxic particles into the homes of poor families.

[2/13/16, 7:30 PM] Shihabur Rahman ([e-mail]): About 920,000 deaths there were attributed to outdoor pollution, such as the particulate matter spread by power plants and vehicle emissions. About 590,000 deaths were attributed to household pollution: the emissions from burning for heating and cooking.

Venkataraman, a professor at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, said India needed to confront all three sources: industrial coal, agricultural fires and household pollution.

The researchers hailed lawmakers in the US, Canada, western Europe and Japan – or at least their predecessors, whom were credited with major accomplishments in curbing pollution over the past 50 years.

“We actually know the way to solve this problem,” Bauer said.