Natalie Cassello

Global Issues

October 11, 2014

Effects of Air Pollution on Health

 

What are the risks of air pollution? As you may know, pollution around the world continues to hurt our environment. Insecticides, exhaust from cars, industrial waste, and millions of other factors contribute to continue to damage our air, water, and soil. There are multiple forms of pollution, including air pollution, water pollution, soil pollution, noise pollution, radioactive pollution, thermal pollution, and light pollution. Each is caused by a different waste material that is introduced into or present in the area. These substances make our ecosystem unbalanced and create many detrimental results. Air pollution is widely known as the most dangerous type because mass amounts of substance are added to the atmosphere everyday. According to Conserve Energy Future, a person will breathe in 3,080 gallons of air on average in a single day. As a result, air pollution has a direct negative impact on the public health across the world. This paper will focus on these repercussions in the United States of America, India, Kenya, Germany, and Denmark.

 

Air pollution is hazardous to the cardiovascular system. It has been proven to increase heart disease and risk factors. According to the American Heart Association, air pollution is a serious contribution to many cardiac issues in the United States. Robert D. Brook from the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine at the University of Michigan claimed that because we are exposed to air pollution throughout our lifetime, there are high risks of factors, such as high blood pressure and high cholesterol. He explained, “A recent report from the American Cancer Society study cohort found that long-term exposure to fine-particulate air pollution at levels that occur in North America increased the risk for cardiovascular mortality.”  Fine-particulate matter in the atmosphere includes small particles from tobacco products, traffic pollution, and many other modern chemicals which continue to increase the mortality rate. Ischemic Heart Disease, or coronary attacks in which the heart is not supplied with enough blood or oxygen, seemed to have the highest mortality rates. This research supports the idea that air pollution is harming the public health in the United States. These particles are so small that they can enter the bloodstream and cause inflammation throughout the body. This may lead to a heart attack, stroke, cardiac arrest, and other chronic diseases, including asthma and diabetes. Many populated American cities have a lot of smog in the environment from the exhaust from traffic. This is the air that many Americans are forced to reuse, in order to survive, however, it may be killing them faster. The body begins to get sick after breathing in the polluted air for years and building up poisonous substances, including secondhand smoke, particulate matter, carbon monoxide, sulfur dioxide, ozone, lead, and nitrates. Even if you do not have heart problems, inhaling air pollution can shorten your life by a couple of years. Air pollution is one of the top ten causes of death on earth, estimating around 50,000 victims per year, according to Conserve Energy Future.

 

Harmful substances in the air can also cause many respiratory problems, such as asthma, lung cancer, and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD). This idea can be seen through the statistics of asthma patients in India. As mentioned by the Editorial Board of The New York Times in the article India’s Air Pollution Emergency, “More people die of asthma in India than anywhere else in the world. Indoor air pollution, mostly from cooking fires, and outdoor air pollution are the third and fifth leading causes of death in India.” The severe air conditions in Delhi have allowed 3,000 children to die within a single year, which makes up 23 percent of all child mortality worldwide. Because kids are still growing, the contaminated air has a worse impact on them. Their small lungs take in as much air as possible, but because they carry such a low capacity, their air seems more polluted. Also, their bodies are so much smaller that the pollution is able to spread much faster and easier, which makes them sick more often. This sad situation is a major problem for the respiratory system and causes many people in India to die of asthma. There are many causes of asthma. It can be inherited, or it can be triggered by exposure to an irritant. Irritants can include allergens, respiratory infections, exercise, cold air, air pollutants, stress, and many more. So, the toxins from the air, such as smoke, can cause someone to develop asthma. This forces people to struggle even more to receive oxygen to breath properly. India has been forced to set strict laws in order to protect their environment and public health. The goal is to get all 180 cities, whose particulate matter in 2010 was six times higher than standard, to an adequate level, according to the World Health Organization. Since February of this year, India has been monitoring its pollution very carefully. They want to limit the amount of cars on the road and diesel burned. By doing this, the air will be less contaminated and the people will hopefully have a lower risk of respiratory issues. Then, India will not be the country with the highest rate of deaths by asthma and pollution will have a lower rank for the cause of death.

 

Scientists have also started to conduct experiments and research on air pollution in parts of Africa. Doctor Linden from the University of Mainz, in Germany, suggested after research in Nairobi, Kenya that, “Africa is urbanizing quickly, and pollution from sources like vehicle exhaust, wood burning and dusty dirt roads has reached worrisome levels in many cities.” The dust particles seemed to be at least five times bigger than the dirt in Gothenburg, Sweden. Another observation was that the biggest particles were found in the central business region because of all the vehicle exhaust. This filthy air has been known to clog and damage the lungs, leading to respiratory issues, similar to the situation in India. When the lungs are filled with contaminated air the body can also lose oxygen and go into cardiac arrest. If they are continuously exposed to and breathing in the same filthy air, then they will become more and more damaged, increasing the chance of heart failure. This process may also trigger asthma in some victims. In a worse case scenario, COPD may develop in the lungs, in the form of chronic bronchitis or emphysema, and it could become very difficult to breathe regularly. Industrial African countries, such as Kenya, are working to limit air contamination.

 

Impure air has also been proven to increase the risk of diabetes. A study in Germany tested the risk factor of air pollution on Type Two Diabetes. Data was collected in the North Rhine Westphalia in 1985, 1994, and 2006. West Germany is a very modern and industrialized area, so there is a lot of air contamination due to the traffic. Seven districts, each with a different pollution levels were observed, including five industrialized areas, Ruhr, Duisburg, Essen, Gelsenkirchen, and Heme. These areas contain a lot of coal and steel factories, as well as traffic. Borken and Dulmen were chosen as the two nonindustrialized towns. 1,775 nondiabetic, 55 year old women of the Study on the Influence of Air Pollution on Lung, Inflammation, and Aging (SALIA) cohort were used in this investigation. The experiment concluded, “Traffic-related air pollution is associated with incident type two diabetes among elderly women. Subclinical inflammation may be a mechanism linking air pollution with type two diabetes.” 10.5 percent of the women were diagnosed with diabetes after the investigation. These 187 women seemed to be very similar. They were not as educated as the healthier women, were exposed to more dust, used ovens for heat, and this group included smokers. The high amounts of particulate matter in the air is linked to causing diabetes. The pollution negatively affects the body’s ability to metabolize glucose. Therefore, harming the public health one person at a time, making them diabetic. These mutated genes will eventually be inherited by their children, who will breathe the same contaminated air and, most likely, also develop diabetes.

 

A similar situation was found by Reuters Health in New York by researching and collecting data from an experiment that was conducted in Denmark. The study concluded, “People who live in areas with high levels of traffic-related air pollution may face a slightly increased risk of developing diabetes.” This supports the hypothesis from the study in Germany that air pollution causes diabetes. Apparently, nitrogen dioxide in car exhaust increases the threat of diabetes by four percent. The particulate matter in the air induced insulin resistance. Insulin in the pancreas is supposed to control the amount of sugar in the blood. If the insulin does not do its job, there will be too much sugar spreading throughout the body. John Brownstein, an epidemiologist at the Children’s Hospital Boston, told Reuters Health and wrote a journal in Diabetes Cares stating, “that air pollution may actually contribute to the development of diabetes.” Zorana J. Andersen looked at 52,000 people in Denmark and discovered that 5.5 percent of healthy 50 to 65 year olds were diagnosed with diabetes. Those who were already diabetics seemed more vulnerable to other health problems caused by air pollution. Although it seems very unlikely, long-term exposure to air pollution can do very strange, harmful things.

 

The direct effects of air pollution on the human body are endless. There are so many negative results on our environment. It has been proven to lead to many cardiovascular risks and diseases, respiratory problems, and diabetes in multiple countries around the world, including the United States of America, India, Germany, Denmark, and Kenya. According to the World Health Organization, one in eight deaths worldwide were caused by air pollution. Air pollution is very dangerous because it is an inevitable process. Waste products from insecticides, smog from factories, and car exhaust will continue to contaminate the atmosphere unless people are motivated to change their ways. Simply, walking, riding a bike, or taking public transport has the ability to reduce air pollution. This is why we should attempt to limit the pollution that we personally add to the atmosphere.

 

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