() — For days, images of New York drowning in smog have stunned America as residents struggle to deal with the unknown challenge of severe air pollution.
Smoke, originating from wildfires in Canada, has prompted authorities to issue air quality alerts on the US East Coast and people have once again donned N95 face masks, largely abandoned since the time. of the pandemic. On social networks, people share photos of the “apocalyptic” scenes left by the smog and tips to minimize health risks.
Outside of West Coast states like California, which experience annual wildfires, such scenes are rare in the US.
Half a world away, however, the fight against smog is nothing new. And the intense air pollution caused by the noxious smog, fumes and industrial chemicals that choke many of Asia’s major cities for much of the year could become the norm for many more around the world as the crisis worsens. climate.
A security guard looks on from the top of Rockefeller Center in New York as the city is covered in smog on June 7, 2023. (Credit: Andrew Kelly/Reuters)
air pollution in india
Last year, six of the world’s 10 most polluted cities were in India, according to the IQAir monitoring network. Researchers have estimated that bad air could be reducing the life expectancy of hundreds of millions of people in that country. up to nine years. In 2019, air pollution is believed to have caused almost 1.6 million deaths in the country.
The capital, New Delhi, is regularly shrouded in smogthanks to several factors, including vehicle emissions, coal-fired power plants, and the annual practice of burning agricultural fields to prepare the land for its next harvest.
That means its people are exposed to high levels of fine particulate matter, or PM2.5, a widely used indicator of harmful air pollution. The tiny contaminant is highly dangerous; when inhaled, it can penetrate deep into lung tissue and enter the bloodstream, and has been linked to health problems, including asthma and heart disease.
That smog comes from sources like burning fossil fuels, dust storms and wildfires, meaning New York is now choked with PM2.5 particles.
Heavy smog and low visibility in New Delhi, India on January 9, 2023. (Credit: Sanchit Khanna/Hindustan Times/Getty Images)
New York’s PM2.5 levels peaked Wednesday afternoon, measuring 303.3 micrograms per cubic meter. For comparison, the World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines recommend a limit of an average annual level of 5 micrograms per cubic meter; London measured 9.4 micrograms per cubic meter on Wednesday and Hong Kong measured 21 micrograms per cubic meter, both safely within IQAir’s “good” range.
Pollution in Southeast Asia
Many Southeast Asian countries are also all too familiar with the disruption to daily life that air pollution can cause, especially during the annual stubble burning season, when farmers set fire to the straw stubble left over after harvest. of grains.
In 2019, the air got so bad in Malaysia that dozens of students became sick and experienced vomiting, leading to the closure of more than 400 schools throughout the country.
Just a few months later, Malaysia was once again shrouded in dense haze that stemmed from large-scale forest fires in nearby Indonesia, reportedly ignited to clear land for paper production, palm oil and other industries.
More recently, the northern Thai city of Chiang Mai earned the unenviable title of the most polluted city in the world for at least a week at a time in April, due to smoke from wildfires and burning crops in other parts of the region. Large numbers of people sought medical attention for respiratory problems, including asthma and shortness of breath, and one hospital said wards were so full they had to turn away some patients.
File photo. A woman wearing a protective mask against pollution on a street in Beijing on March 20, 2017. (Credit: Nicolas Asfouri/AFP/Getty Images)
The “air apocalypse” in China
But perhaps the most notorious city for its pollution and the one that has most successfully turned things around is Beijing.
For years, residents of the Chinese capital breathed acrid air every day. This culminated in the infamous “air apocalypse” 2013, when the air quality index hit 755, surpassing what was supposed to be the top of the scale at 500, according to the US Embassy in Beijing, which monitored air quality daily . That all-time high meant the air was beyond dangerous, forcing residents to lock themselves indoors, wear filtering face masks and air purifiers on high.
The event attracted worldwide media attention and forced the topic into the Chinese mainstream, and soon after, China launched a comprehensive anti-pollution campaignclosing mines and coal plants, installing air monitoring stations across the country, and implementing new regulations.
There are still problems: China has gone back to coal in recent years, rapidly building new power plants even as more and more countries look to renewable energy, but the improvement in the capital is undeniable. In 2021, Beijing recorded its best monthly air quality since records began in 2013; the photos now show mostly blue skies over the city.
This is an encouraging sign and evidence that the right policies and investment can help improve air quality. But, scientists and experts warn, there are only more challenges on the horizon, which even normally good-air cities like New York cannot escape.
Human-caused climate change has exacerbated the hot and dry conditions that allow wildfires to ignite and grow. The scientists recently reported that millions of acres burned by wildfires in the western US and Canada, an area roughly the size of South Carolina, could be attributed to carbon pollution from the world’s largest cement and fossil fuel companies.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau noted “the devastating impacts of climate change” in a statement Wednesday, after speaking with US President Joe Biden about putting out the Quebec fires.
The image of the United Nations building in New York, barely visible through the orange smog, “is the perfect image of how world leaders have failed to stop the climate crisis,” tweeted scientist and climate advocate Lucky Tran on Wednesday, adding in a separate post: “Today, New Yorkers and East Coasters alike are experiencing this impact firsthand.”
