Between 350,000 and 500,000 Chinese die prematurely each year because of
the country's disastrous air pollution, says China's former health
minister
The equivalent of the population of Bristol dies each
year in China because of lethal air pollution, according to Chen Zhu,
who was the country's Health minister until last year.
Mr Chen,
who is also a professor of medicine and a leading molecular biologist,
is the most senior government official to put a human cost on the smog
that regularly clouds Chinese skies.
Until recently, any mention of deaths relating to pollution was strictly censored.
Mr
Chen's claim came in a commentary in December's issue of the Lancet,
co-written with Wang Jinnan, Ma Guoxia and Zhang Yanshen from the
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"Studies
by the World Bank, WHO, and the Chinese Academy for Environmental
Planning on the effect of air pollution on health concluded that between
350 000 and 500000 people die prematurely each year as a result of
outdoor air pollution in China," Mr Chen and his fellow authors noted.
He
added that air pollution has become "the fourth biggest threat to the
health of Chinese people" (behind heart disease, dietary risk and
smoking) and that lung cancer is "now the leading cause of death from
malignant tumours in the country".
Mr Chen said China "now
produces the largest number of major pollutants in the world", and
accounts for half the world's coal consumption.
The estimate that
the authors quoted, however, is lower than the 2010 Global Burden of
Disease Study, also published in the Lancet, which estimated that
airborne particles smaller than 2.5 microns in diameter (PM2.5) caused
1.2 million premature deaths in China in 2010 alone.
Mr Chen's commentary said the Chinese government has now enacted "tough measures" in order to fight the smog.
"According
to research results from the Chinese Academy for Environmental
Planning, 200,000 people will be prevented from dying prematurely each
year if the annual level of PM in Chinese cities reaches the first level
standard of 40 micrograms per cubic metre, as set out in the newly
revised China National Ambient Air Quality Standards," he wrote.
Smoking remains the leading cause of lung cancer, but the number of smokers is falling while lung cancer rates are still rising.
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So it became
national news when, starting from December, Shanghai, Nanjing, and other
cities in that region were cloaked in heavy smog for about a week.
Schools and highways were closed, and many flights were canceled.
Now
China has a smog belt that extends from Beijing all the way to
Shanghai. It took a little more than three years to build up the high
speed railway that connects Beijing and Shanghai, but it took less than
two years for smog to spread from Beijing to Shanghai. At this rate, the
nationalization of smog will be accomplished in even less time. pm2.5
quality of life health alert population density greenpeace green peace A
couple in protective masks walk under haze in Shanghai, China, Friday,
Dec. 6, 2013. Shanghai authorities ordered schoolchildren indoors and
halted all construction Friday as China's financial hub suffered one its
worst bouts of air pollution, bringing visibility down to a few dozen
meters and obscuring the city's spectacular skyline.
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