Air Polution And Outdoor Air Pollution

Public health often involves out of multiple disciplines but at its core, resides in the general interest of the health of populations. How healthy a population is, often depends on their overall environment. Poor air quality can cause undesirable health issues among individuals in sensitive portions of the population who are asthmatic, have lung disease, or even cardiovascular conditions. Especially in areas where communities are affected by the outcomes of policies that directly impact the health of individuals, their safety, and other things.

Living in a place with bad air quality is a risk to everyone, but there are people with significantly higher instability. People with pre-existing maladies, mainly cardiovascular and respiratory, are more susceptible to more severe illnesses. Children are also more vulnerable than healthy adults. This is because their systems and internal organs are not fully

Almost everybody owns a car. These vehicles are pumping pollution straight into the air and filling it with harmful pollutants. However, vehicles are not the only cause of air pollution. One of the other contributors to the burning of fossil fuels are industries. Air pollution consists of particles and gases that are emitted from both natural and manmade sources. The particles that specifically affect people are the ones that are small enough to go down into their airways. These are called fine-particulates (PM2.5), and they are the most critical form of air pollution (Gold and Samet 2013). With air pollution comes a whole array of health problems, predominantly focused on the nose, throat, and lungs. Both rural and urban environments contain different pollutants, such as infections, chemical

Statistics indicate that more than four people in five who live in urban areas are negatively affected regarding the standard of the quality of air that the World Health Organization recommends as safe for breathing by human beings (WHO, 2016). These means that roughly all urban regions of the world are affected. However, there are those that suffer the most and these include the low income cities especially found in the developing countries. WHO analytics covers more than 3000 cities in 103 countries spread across the world (WHO, 2016). The figures how that while 56% of cities in high income cities do not meet the standards set by World Health Organization, the percentage shoots to 98% when looking at the medium and low income cities that do not meet the standards (WHO, 2016). From the map produced to indicate the implication of their statistics, it confirms that 92% of the people’s population in the world is breathing polluted air.

To combat these threats, federal and state level policies have been put in place to help monitor and reduce air pollution. Perhaps the most far reaching of these was the 1990 Clean Air Act which required the reformulating of gasoline and set emission standards from hydrocarbons and diesel particulate matter. Subsequent amendments to this act required the removal of lead from gasoline and limitations to the amount of sulfur in diesel fuel. (Air toxics from motor vehicles. August 1994) Government regulations on vehicles added requirements for emission reduction equipment such as catalytic converters.(Motor vehicles and toxic air pollutants.2008) Specific federal government

Outdoor air pollution, is not the only air pollution that chokingly grips developing countries, indoor air pollution also rids the air of clean breathing. Mostly over looked, and unconsidered when you think of air pollution in developing countries. Yet, indoor air pollution, or household pollution, is deadly as outdoor air pollution and possibly worse. Indoor air pollution affects a massive amount of people by causing health issues, and contributing to the death rate. Indoor air pollution contributes. In most cases, the pollution levels in houses are one hundred times worse than recommended guidelines state. “4.3 million people die a year from exposure to indoor air pollution.” according to WHO data sheets.

The research presented in this paper will discuss poor air quality due to outdoor air pollution and its’ effects on human health. I have examined numerous documents, learning about the anthropogenic causes of the air pollution in addition to studying the hazards the contaminated air presents to the public, particularly in urban areas. I have created a policy that I believe directly addresses the current needs of the atmosphere in order to continue to reduce the amount of pollution in the air we breathe, in turn improving our overall health.

​Each day our lives are changing due to the harmful effects of air pollutants. Air pollution is a public health issue and an environmental problem we must face head on, which causes extreme harm. In fact, one in eight deaths worldwide are a result of air pollution exposure (World Health Organization, 2014). This is only one of the side effects of air pollutants that are taking over our Earth. In order to put an end to air pollution, we must recognize what industries are causing air pollution and work to manage them. An ultimate solution of reducing air pollution needs to be established worldwide. Therefore, it can be seen that air pollutants have negative effects and a harmful impact on human health, which can be seen through the health risks associated with air pollutants, the industries that cause air pollution, and the solution of air pollution.

Air pollution is one of the most actual environmental problems in the world. Increasing traffic density and energy consumption lead to increased pollution causing substances emissions in ambient air. It is a significant risk factor for multiple health conditions including lung cancer, respiratory and heart diseases. Therefore it is important to keep up with latest data about actual air quality to react timely and initiate appropriate environment management procedures when pollution levels rise to high (Snyder et. al, 2013).

Air pollution is known to create several respiratory and heart conditions along with Cancer, among other threats to the body. Millions are known to have died due to direct or indirect effects of Air pollution. People in areas exposed to air pollutants are said to commonly suffer from pneumonia and asthma.

With the growth of number of factories, transportation and various exhaust gases today, a level of air pollution has significantly increased in the environment. The smog enveloping the city is the most visible and obvious sign of urban pollution. However, even invisible harmful particles can have a big impact on the quality of airspace. In general, any substance released into the environment and having an adverse effect, is an air pollution. Hazardous substances present in the air, not only affect the environment but to a greater extent on the person who breathes it.

WHO estimates that Indoor Air Pollution accounted for 4.3 million deaths compared to 3.7 million deaths for Outdoor Air Pollution. Furthermore, as indicated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), many organic pollutants indoors are 2 to 5 times more concentrate than outdoors regardless of the geographic location, whether in rural or highly industrial areas. These concentrations can possibly reach 1000 times higher after certain activities such as paint stripping. In addition to the higher concentration, a person spends about 90% of their time indoors; therefore, Indoor Air Pollution is just as important as Outdoor Air Pollution.

Air pollution isn't just outside - the air inside buildings can also be polluted and affect your health. It can be a from minor upper respiratory irritation to chronic respiratory and heart disease, lung cancer, mild respiratory infections in children and chronic bronchitis in adults. Aggravating pre-existing heart and lung disease, or asthmatic attacks are easier to effect those who are more exposed and past the beginning stages. In addition, short- and long-term exposures have also been categorized with premature mortality and reduced life expectancy.

“Normal human activity is more harmful for nature than the greatest wars or nuclear explosions in history.” For the last decade, pollution has been on a steep rise all across the world with air pollution taking a lead. In India, particularly in Delhi, the level of pollution is scarily high making it the eleventh most polluted metropolis in the world[1]. A considerable role in pollution is played by Air pollution. Air pollution is caused by road dust, industrial gases, vehicular pollution, burning of solid wastes and concrete batching[2].

Rapidly increasing air pollution is deadly for human life and there is an urgent need to act against it. Air pollution leads to about 7 million deaths every year. Effective strategies need to be developed to tackle the problem of air pollution.