Urban air pollution and health effects

High exposure to both indoor and outdoor ambient air pollution has been associated with a number of illnesses, including  

Since urban air is generally more polluted than nural air, the incidence of related diseases is more common in cities. For example, lung cancer mortality is higher in Chinese cities than in the nation as a whole and 60% of Calcutta residents, suffer from respiratory diseases, compared to the national average of 3%. Furthermore, it has been estimated in Bangkok that SPM could cause up to 1,400 deaths in the city per 

Acute Respiratory Infection (ARI), such as pneumonia, is one of the biggest causes of death for young children in the Asian region. ARI is also responsible for more episodes of illness than any other disease, with the exception of diarrhoea, and it is well known that ARI is aggravated by exposure to pollutants and indoor environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). 

Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease (COLD) and Cor Pulmonale 

COLD is known to be an outcome of chronic air pollution exposure. Although tobacco smoke is known to be the major risk factor, studies in India and Nepal have found that non-smoking women who regularly cook on biomass stoves exhibit a higher prevalence of COLD than would be expected, or than appears in women who use them less frequently. Indeed, owing to indoor exposure, nearly 15% of non-smoking women in Nepal (20 years and older) had chronic bronchitis a very high rate for nonsmokers (ESCAP, 1995). 

In China, COLD was associated with long term exposure to indoor coal smoke (Chen et al., 1998), and in India, Cor pulmonale (heart disease secondary to chronic lung disease) has been found to be more prevalent, and on average to develop earlier, in non-smoking women who cook with biomass fuels than those do not. 

Tuberculosis, which continues to be a serious public health problem in the region, is also aggravated by air pollution. In 1991, more than 2,000 000 cases were reported in India and Indonesia alone (Table 5), and just 10 countries in the Asian region accounted for over one million deaths. 

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