Air pollution from fires linked to 1.5 million deaths a year
By AFP
November 28, 2024
The study was released a week after Ecuador declared a national emergency due to forest fires - Copyright AFP GREG BAKER
Air pollution caused by fires is linked to more than 1.5 million deaths a year worldwide, the vast majority occurring in developing countries, a major new study said on Thursday.
This death toll is expected to rise in the coming years as climate change makes wildfires more frequent and intense, according to the study in The Lancet journal.
The international team of researchers looked at existing data on “landscape fires”, which include both wildfires that rage through nature and planned fires such as controlled burns on farming land.
Around 450,000 deaths a year from heart disease were linked to fire-related air pollution between 2000 and 2019, the researchers said.
A further 220,000 deaths from respiratory disease were attributed to the smoke and particulates spewed into the air by fire.
From all causes around the world, a total of 1.53 million annual deaths were associated with air pollution from landscape fires, according to the study.
More than 90 percent of these deaths were in low and middle-income countries, it added, with nearly 40 percent in sub-Saharan Africa alone.
The countries with the highest death tolls were China, the Democratic Republic of Congo, India, Indonesia, and Nigeria.
A record amount of illegal burning of farm fields in northern India has been partly blamed for noxious smog that has recently been choking the capital New Delhi.
The authors of the Lancet study called for “urgent action” to address the huge death toll from landscape fires.
The disparity between rich and poor nations further highlights “climate injustice”, in which those who have contributed the least to global warming suffer from it the most, they added.
Some of the ways people can avoid smoke from fires — such as moving away from the area, using air purifiers and masks, or staying indoors — are not available to people in poorer countries, the researchers pointed out.
So they called for more financial and technological support for people in the hardest-hit countries.
The study was released a week after UN climate talks where delegates agreed to a boost in climate funding that developing countries slammed as insufficient.
It also came after Ecuador declared a national emergency over forest fires that have razed more than 10,000 hectares in the country’s south.
The world has also been battered by hurricanes, droughts, floods and other extreme weather events during what is expected to be the hottest year in recorded history.
Air pollution linked to longer duration of long-COVID symptoms
New study explores the association between different environmental exposures and Long-COVID in a Catalan population cohort
Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal)
Exposure to air pollutants (PM2.5 and PM10) is associated with an increased risk of persistent long-COVID symptoms, partly due to its impact on the severity of the acute infection. This is the main conclusion of a study led by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), a centre supported by “la Caixa” Foundation, in collaboration with the Germans Trias i Pujol Research Institute (IGTP), and published in Environmental Health Perspectives.
Long-COVID is a heterogeneous condition in which symptoms like fatigue, breathlessness, and cognitive issues persist for months after a COVID-19 infection and cannot be explained by other diagnoses. The real burden of long-COVID remains unclear, but millions of people are estimated to be affected worldwide. Its risk factors are also not well understood, since even people with mild or no symptoms during acute infection can develop long-COVID.
“We previously found that air pollution exposure is linked to a higher risk of severe COVID-19 and a lower vaccine response, but there are very few studies on long-COVID and the environment,” explains Manolis Kogevinas, ISGlobal researcher and senior author of the study. In this study, he and his colleagues investigated whether air pollution and other environmental exposures such as noise, artificial light at night, and green spaces, were associated with the risk- or persistence- of Long-COVID.
The study followed over 2,800 adults of the COVICAT cohort, aged 40- 65 years living in Catalonia who during the pandemic completed three online questionnaires (2020, 2021, 2023). These surveys collected information on COVID-19 infections, vaccination status, health status, and sociodemographic data. Researchers estimated residential exposure to noise, particulate matter, ozone, nitrogen dioxide, green spaces, and light at night for each participant.
Long-COVID risk factors
The analysis showed that one in four people who contracted COVID-19 experienced lingering symptoms for three months or more, with 5% experiencing persistent symptoms for two years or more. Women, individuals with lower education levels, those with prior chronic conditions, and those who had severe COVID-19 were at highest risk of long-COVID. Vaccination, on the other hand, made a positive difference: only 15% of vaccinated participants developed long-COVID compared to 46% of unvaccinated ones.
Air pollution and persistent long-COVID
Exposure to particulate matter (PM2.5 and PM10) in the air was associated with a slight increase in the risk of persistent long-COVID (i.e. people who reported long-Covid in 2021 and whose symptoms were still present the last week before the 2023 interview). The risk of persistent long-COVID increased linearly with greater exposure to particulate matter in the air. In contrast, factors such as nearby green spaces or traffic noise showed little impact on long-COVID.
The researchers note that while air pollution may not directly cause long-COVID, it could increase the severity of the initial infection, which, in turn, raises the risk of long COVID. “This hypothesis is supported by the association between particulate matter and the most severe and persistent cases of long-COVID, but not with all cases of long-COVID,” says Apolline Saucy, first author of the study.
Further research is needed to break down the different types of long-term symptoms and get a more detailed picture of how environmental factors might play a role. “This type of studies is particularly relevant as more people continue to recover from COVID-19 and deal with its potential long-term effects,” says Kogevinas.
About COVICAT
The COVICAT cohort is a COVID-19-population-based cohort designed to characterize the health impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the population in Catalonia, Spain. Baseline data originates from the GCAT (Genomes for Life) project of the Germans Trias i Pujol Research Institute (IGTP).
Reference
Saucy A, Espinosa A, Iraola-Guzman S, Castaño-Vinyals G, Harding BN, Karachaliou M, Ranzani I, De Cid R, Garcia-Aymerich J, Kogevinas M. Environmental exposures and Long-COVID in a Prospective Population-Based Study in Catalonia (COVICAT study). Environmental Health Perspectives. 2024. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP15377
Journal
Environmental Health Perspectives
Method of Research
Observational study
Subject of Research
People
Article Title
Environmental exposures and Long-COVID in a Prospective Population-Based Study in Catalonia (COVICAT study)
Article Publication Date
27-Nov-2024
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