India leads the world in pollution related deaths, followed by China and Nigeria. As India is fast growing on the path of development, millions of new vehicles are on the roads and the lack of electric vehicles along with more coal firing power plants have made India the leading country in the world regarding pollution related deaths.
According to the WHO, more than 1 million premature deaths in China are caused by air pollution every year and India leads the world with pollution related deaths which also crosses more than a million in a year. To be more shocking, air pollution would decrease the lifespan of a human being from 15 to 20 years because it makes innocent people suffer from chronic diseases.
Breathing in polluted air can be very harmful for our health which leads to loss of life or gets easily affected by chronic respiratory diseases. Long term exposure to air pollution has been associated with diseases of the heart, lung cancers and other severe respiratory health problems. That's why it's importantfor us to monitor air pollution.
Air pollution is measured with the Air Quality Index, or AQI. The lower the AQ I, the cleaner the air is. However, if you are outside when the AQI is over 100, it's about the same as breathing in exhaust from a fuel powered vehicle all day. Things that cause poor air quality in cities are mainly due to the huge traffic of petrol and diesel vehicles, forest fires around, burning of agricultural waste, etc.
People need to breathe and so do many other animals and plants because breathing is part of a process called respiration. Carbon dioxide in the air can be both good and bad. When humans and animals breathe, we give off an odorless gas called carbon dioxide and plants use this gas along with sunlight to make food and oxygen which is called photosynthesis.
Rush hour with a huge number of vehicles on road especially with blockages in traffic is an obvious source of local pollution, but air pollution can travel long distances, sometimes across continents on international weather patterns. The recent Australian fires have burned across an area twice the size of Switzerland while claiming many lives too which is also a result of climate change.
The year 2019 without any lockdown had nearly 1.7 million deaths due to air pollution in India which was shocking but there was not even half number of deaths reported in the year 2020 due to air pollution which had several days of lockdown that reduced transportation, construction and functioning of factories to a great extent. This clearly shows the proof of deaths caused due to air pollution.
Both the poisonous emissions which cause air pollution and the Coronavirus is affecting the respiratory system initially but the effect of air pollution is very much more complicated and dangerous than Coronavirus which also affects the human respiratory system. As Covid - 19 is ravaging globally, many studies have linked air pollution to higher Coronavirus case numbers and deaths.
The mortality rates due to air pollution is so huge when compared to the loss of lives in the recent ongoing Coronavirus pandemic, which clearly shows that air pollution is such a greater disaster than the virus. If we had taken the same precaution, care and importance given for Covid - 19, then air pollution could have been reduced to a great extent and millions of lives could have been saved.
Although air pollution and Covid - 19 are universal disasters, the difference is that the latter is a contagious disease with a particular carrier spreading faster even though it does not be in the air beyond a considerable distance and time but the particles that cause air pollution are spread to masses extending beyond borders and contaminates the atmosphere without a carrier.
It's high time to replace petrol and diesel vehicles with electric vehicles, coal power plants with solar power plants, concrete roofings with solar panel roofings, burning of agricultural wastes with latest recycling machineries etc. Its very clear that the recent lockdown in the middle of the Coronavirus pandemic has saved many lives from the drastic effects of air pollution.
We hope that our positive steps will reduce air pollution at the earliest and thereby save millions of lives along with the billions affected by chronic respiratory and other related diseases. In addition to that, it will also save the universe as a whole from the tragic effects of climate change like rise in sea level, -thunder storms, more hotter climates etc. caused dueto air pollution.
The main source of household air pollution is the indoor burning of fossil fuels, wood and other biomass based fuels to cook, heat and light homes. Around 3.8 million premature deaths are caused by indoor air pollution each year, the vast majority of them in the developing world. Out of 193 countries, 97 countries have increased the percentage of households.
In many countries, power generation is a leading source of air pollution. Coal burning power plants are a major contributor, while diesel generators are a growing concern in off grid areas. Industrial processes and solvent use in the chemical and mining industries, also pollute the air. Policies and programmers aimed at increasing energy efficiency and production from renewable sources have a direct impact on a country's air quality.
The major sources of air pollution from agriculture include livestock, which produces methane and ammonia, rice paddies, which produce methane, and the burning of agricultural waste. Methane emissions contribute to the formation of ground level ozone, which causes asthma and other respiratory illnesses. Methane is also a more potent global warming gasthan carbon dioxide.
We sincerely welcome all socially committed citizens universally to join hands with your humble contributions as donations to fight against the greatest disaster of mankind which is air pollution and thereby save the millions of people who are losing their precious lives along with the billions of people who are struggling with chronic respiratory diseases every year, due to the disastrous effects of air pollution.
So let's decide today that my smallest contributions can change a disaster which the world is facing and there is no doubt that your life will become more meaningful and even your smallest effort will be a great contribution for the biggest change that the whole universe is thirsting. To know the intensity of the same we can categorically establish that air pollution is thousand times more problematic than the recent coronavirus pandemic which has shaken and shut the whole world for a considerable period of time.
Bank Name : Standard Chartered Bank
Account Number : 5 2 5 0 5 9 0 0 2 1 8
Account: Green Asian Voice Council
Type: Current Account
IFSC : SCBL0036028
Branch: Connaught Place, New Delhi
Bank Name : Standard Chartered Bank
Account Number : 0 1 3 2 5 4 1 0 0 0 1
Account: Green Asian Voice
Type: Current Account
Branch: Kathmandu, Nepal
Swift Code : SCBLNPKA
