Comment by johnthesecure 2 days ago
It's interesting to see the number of deaths caused by pollution. But everyone will die of something. Could it be that many of those people whose death was caused by pollution may have been frail and close to death anyway? I wonder if it would be more useful to talk about quality-life-years (QUALYs) lost as a result of pollution. Probably much harder to get that data though.
There's something to be said about quality of life, too. Just because something doesn't outright kill you (sooner) doesn't mean it's fine to live with it.
I'm not asthmatic, but last summer I had an eye-opening moment about pollution. I live in a very dense city, and I regularly go for short runs in a local park. Last summer I spent a few weeks at my parents' house, who live in the suburbs of the same city, only farther away, in a small town surrounded by fields and forests.
When I went running in the forest, I couldn't believe how easier it felt to breathe and how all-round easier my session felt, event though I ran faster and longer. I don't usually run so fast that I'm out of breath, but that particular time I felt a marked difference in how easy breathing felt. It was as if I needed to breathe in "less air" to get the oxygen I needed.
I had already felt a similar thing after the first covid lockdowns coming back to the city. I had sensation of something "rough" in my throat and had short bouts of coughing. This was a few days after the lockdowns lifted, and people were still weary of public transit so everyone on their dog were sitting in gridlocked cars on the roads.
I think it's the same thing with ambient noise. After some point, we just don't notice it any longer, but it does take its toll in stress and all-round irritability.
Linked from the article this seems interesting: https://ourworldindata.org/data-review-air-pollution-deaths
But from my understanding most deaths attributed to pollution, specially indoors, relate to fireplaces, cooking, oil lighting or other "I'm making smoke indoors" activities which will cause lung issues later on. Even having candles on all the time isn't good for you.
The rest as far as I understand is all estimated by putting a finger in the air and subdividing lung cancer deaths into what they feel like the causes were.
Pollutions impacts people across all age groups, including children and otherwise healthy adults. Many pollution deaths aren't inevitable near-term deaths.
Health effects include:
- Respiratory diseases developing in otherwise healthy people
- Cardiovascular damage at an early age affecting long-term health
- Developmental impacts on children with lifelong consequences
- Cancer and other conditions with substantial life-shortening effects
Found this in an article linked to by this one:
Exposure to air pollutants increases our risk of developing a range of diseases. These diseases fall into three major categories: cardiovascular diseases, respiratory diseases, and cancers.
It makes sense to think of these estimates as ‘avoidable deaths’ – they are the number of deaths that would be avoided if air pollution was reduced to levels that would not increase the risk of developing these lethal diseases.Yeah, but there's a big difference between dying a few months earlier when you'd already be bedridden with your mind mostly gone and dying 50 years early.
Which is why QALYs are such a good metric.
You make a good point but I think adding QALYs to this discussion is unnecessary complication, for one reason: like most public health menaces, pollution will impact lifespan and healthspan proportionatly, ie you’ll die sooner and also live worse years if you’re exposed. There is a proportionately better chance of ageing well and dieing later if you avoid it.
QALYs really shine when measuring a one-off risk, such as an operation or cancer treatment that might add lifespan but decrease healthspan. If QALY data exists for pollution that’s great, but I think we can easily extrapolate the impact in healthspan from the toll in lifespan.
You're right, "everyone dies of something" is technically true, but the key issue with pollution isn’t just that it shortens life, it's how it does it. Chronic exposure doesn’t just tip over the already frail, it increases the burden of disease across the board
There was some interesting data from China where the north got free coal heating but not the south. There was a difference in life expectancy of 5.5 years. Maybe not the best free gift. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/jul/08/northern...
I think pollution is better thought of like starvation, as something that makes you frailer so that you end up dying over something that a healthier person would have survived. Pretty much the opposite of the perspective you take.
You don't see a lot of people arguing that starvation doesn't mean much because the deaths of starving people are more directly caused by disease or injury.
As you said, everyone will die of something and those who die are close to death. Therefore you can now justify abandoning any treatment that increases lifespans. The new baseline lifespan is shorter, therefore everyone is closer to death, let's abandon the next treatment.
>It's interesting to see the number of deaths caused by pollution. But everyone will die of something.
People can die because they don't have access to energy or agricultural products.
I wonder what would be the word population now had we not used fire, coal oil, haf we not grew rice and cereals, had we not raised cows and sheep.
A more important question is what would the world look like if we didn't waste resources[0].
Some would consider raising cows and sheep to be bad idea too, given how inefficient it is in terms of input resources for output calories -- not to mention it has very detrimental effects on ecosystems.
[0] https://www.cnn.com/2024/03/27/climate/un-food-waste-one-bil...
One cohort susceptible is asthmatics.
Most asthmatics can live a long, healthy life - certainly not die at the age of 9 https://apnews.com/article/asthma-europe-london-air-pollutio...
I, along with other asthmatics, did notice a marked improvement in symptoms during the Covid 19 lockdowns as there was less traffic on the roads - https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8011425/
This is the problem with "Well, these people are frail, and you have to die of something" assertions. See also, Covid 19 and "most people who died weren't healthy, they had other conditions!".