99% of world breathes unhealthy air: new WHO data

Almost the entire global population (99 per cent) breathes air that exceeds WHO’s air quality limits and threatens its health, according to the 2022 update to the World Health Organisation’s air quality database.
More than 6,000 cities in 117 countries are now monitoring air quality but their residents are still breathing unhealthy levels of fine particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide, while people in low and middle-income countries suffer the highest exposure, according to WHO data.
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The findings have prompted WHO to highlight the importance of curbing fossil fuel use and taking other tangible steps to reduce air pollution levels.
Released in the lead up to World Health Day on April 7, of which the theme this year is ‘Our planet, our health’, the WHO data has taken, for the first time, ground measurements of annual mean concentrations of nitrogen dioxide (NO2), a common urban pollutant and precursor of particulate matter and ozone. It also includes measurements of particulate matter with diameters equal or smaller than 10 μm (PM10) or 2.5 μm (PM2.5). Both groups of pollutants originate mainly from human activities related to fossil fuel combustion.

The new air quality database is the most extensive yet in its coverage of air pollution exposure on the ground. As many as 2,000 more cities and human settlements are now recording ground monitoring data for particulate matter, PM10 and/or PM2.5, than in the last update. This marks an almost sixfold rise in reporting since the database was first made in 2011.
Meanwhile, evidence base for the damage air pollution does to the human body has been growing rapidly and points to significant harm caused even low levels of many air pollutants.
Particulate matter, especially PM 2.5, is capable of penetrating deep into the lungs and entering the bloodstream, causing cardiovascular, cerebrovascular (stroke) and respiratory impacts. NO2 is associated with respiratory diseases, particularly asthma, leading to respiratory symptoms (such as coughing, wheezing or difficulty breathing), hospital admissions and visits to emergency rooms. WHO last year revised its air quality guidelines, making them more stringent in an effort to help countries better evaluate the healthiness of their own air.
WHO is calling for rapid intensification of actions to adopt or revise and implement national air quality standards, according to the latest WHO Air Quality Guidelines.

In the 117 countries monitoring air quality, the air in 17 per cent of cities in high-income countries falls below WHO’s air quality guidelines for PM 2.5 or PM 10. In low and middle-income countries, air quality in less than 1 per cent of the cities complies with WHO recommended thresholds. “After surviving a pandemic, it is unacceptable to still have seven million preventable deaths and countless preventable lost years of good health due to air pollution. Yet too many investments are still being sunk into a polluted environment rather than in clean, healthy air,” said Dr Maria Neira, WHO director, Department of Environment, Climate Change and Health.