Pollution’s Fatal Threat Gains Urgency After 9 Million Died In One Year

That’s the takeaway of a report published Tuesday in The Lancet Planetary Health, which analyzed the combined health risks of air, water and toxic chemical pollution in 2019. The results show that pollution is responsible for around 9 million premature deaths each year, or one in six globally. That puts its toll on par with smoking.

“We haven’t been yelling from the top of the streets, saying, ‘Look at this!’ loud enough,'” said Richard Fuller, the report’s lead author and the founder and CEO of the nonprofit Pure Earth, which focuses on addressing pollution in low- and middle-income countries.

Fuller’s report is one of two this week that have sounded the alarm about the insidious danger of pollution. The second study, published Monday, looked at the U.S. and calculated that 53,000 premature deaths could be prevented per year in the country if all energy-related emissions were eliminated.

Fuller’s study found that more than 90 percent of pollution-related deaths occur in low- and middle-income countries. The countries with the highest pollution-related deaths in 2019 were India, China, Nigeria, Pakistan and Indonesia.

Air pollution — from sources like vehicles, power plants and crop burning — is the most dire threat, since it was responsible for more than 6.5 million deaths in 2019, more than any other form of pollution that year. Air pollution increases the risk of heart disease, respiratory infections, lung cancer, tuberculosis, chronic respiratory disease, diabetes, kidney disease and low birth weight, all of which can lead to premature death.

A changing mix of types of pollution

Pollution-related deaths have stayed flat worldwide since 2015, according to Fuller’s research. A previous study of his showed that pollution was also responsible for 9 million premature deaths in 2015. But the dominant forms of pollution have changed over time.

His new report suggests that deaths from household air and water pollution have declined since 2000, while deaths from outdoor air pollution and toxic chemicals have risen more than 66 percent since then.

That’s in part due to the growth of developing economies, a process that often leads to improvements in household sanitation while simultaneously increasing the use of industrial chemicals and fossil fuels, experts said.