“Environmental pollution is an incurable disease. It can only be prevented.”
Barry Commoner.
On a similar topic as my previous post on the relation of COVID-19 and air pollution, a study conducted by Pozzer et al. this year has estimated that exposure to air pollution could increase someone’s chances of dying from COVID-19 by 15% worldwide, but people from East Asia would be most affected, and their chances stand at 27%.
However, please note that this is just a correlation found between these two factors, and they do not imply any causational relationship (although this could be possible as well, more research has to be done to confirm that).
These are some useful videos that I have found that talked about this study, or you can take a look at my summarised version that comes after the videos!
For more bite-sized versions:
For a more comprehensive version:
Main Research Findings Relating to Air Pollution from the Research
- Made use of data from COVID-19 and SARS with relation to air pollution data collected in countries like China and the US.
- Investigated relationships of the changes to the lungs structure due to long-term exposure to particulate matter, particularly PM2.5 as it is very small and has harmful effects on human health and the respiratory system. With lowered immunity from the body due to effects of prolonged exposure to PM2.5, these people would naturally be more susceptible to COVID-19, as it was shown that COVID-19 would affect the lungs the most too to cause immune responses such as inflamed lungs and other related respiratory problems.
- The combined effects of prolonged PM2.5 exposure and COVID-19 can aggravate pre-existing respiratory conditions and cause further lung injury by damaging the alveoli, leading to other complications such as the onset of strokes and life-threatening respiratory conditions.
- This relationship can go both ways: weakened immunity from the exposure to COVID-19 can also increase susceptibility to health problems caused by air pollution due to complications in the respiratory system caused by the exposure to COVID-19.
- But adverse health impact can certainly be observed for individuals with long-term exposure air pollution and the onset of COVID-19, making them the most vulnerable, as health problems like stroke, heart failures and heart attacks could lead to death as the most serious consequence.
Limitations of the Research
- More research has to be done in other areas to prove the credibility and reliability of this study, especially when COVID-19 is still an ongoing pandemic. It would not be possible for countries to continuously provide exact numbers of deaths caused by COVID-19 that have relations to air pollution, as the number of deaths is still increasing.
- As a result, the research made use of mathematical modelling to provide an estimate on future values, which might not be as accurate with the unpredictable nature of COVID-19 as a virus that could have varying impacts on different places.
My Thoughts
I think that there are some truths in the correlation found between related deaths arising from COVID-19 and pre-existing prolonged exposure to air pollutants, especially PM2.5. Before COVID-19, there are already research done to support the harmful health effects brought about by PM2.5, that could pose and aggravate existing or new respiratory symptoms, making these affected people more vulnerable to other health problems due to associated problems with weakened immunity. Furthermore, COVID-19 is a virus that would cause many to experience more severe health impacts in their respiratory systems. Therefore, I think that it is a situation of a double-whammy if vulnerable people are exposed to both prolonged PM2.5 exposure brought about by air pollution and COVID-19 at the same time.
I also believe that people from developing regions, particularly in Asia, would be the most hit by both of these, as they are mostly the victims of air pollution in their countries due to the presence of widespread air pollution from development and industrialisation through non-sustainable methods of managing pollution from factories. Furthermore, many of them do not have access to quality healthcare services in their countries, which would make it difficult for them to seek immediate medical attention should they experience any COVID-19 symptoms or respiratory problems. Concerning COVID-19 as a contagious virus, the lack of access to protective equipment like masks or clean water to maintain personal hygiene would play a huge role in enabling the ease of spread of the virus in those developing countries. This lack of resources and their development situation make this group of people most susceptible to the negative impacts listed in this research, which is very unfair.
I hope that this post has helped to shed some light on the other side of the story! From this whole COVID-19 situation, we can also see the inequalities present in our world today in terms of pollution and availability of resources, that could impact the health of people in different parts of the world today.
Disappearing into thin air,
Yuin Chi
References:
Pozzer, A., Dominici, F., Haines, A., Witt, C., Münzel, T. and Lelieveld, J., 2020. Regional and global contributions of air pollution to the risk of death from COVID-19. Cardiovascular Research.
Air Pollution 