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Every year in Europe 400,000 people die from air pollution
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Air pollution is the biggest threat to health
More than 400,000 people die prematurely each year in the European Union as a result of air pollution. These and exposure to chemicals are the environmental factors with the greatest health risk.
Researchers have examined the impact of the environment on the health of Europeans. Result: air pollution, noise and heat are especially dangerous. But there are good news.
METERMore than 400,000 people in the European Union die prematurely each year as a result of air pollution. This is the result of a report by the European Environment Agency (EEA), which was published in Copenhagen on Tuesday. The report analyzed data on the impact of the environment on the health and well-being of Europeans. According to this, air pollution remains the biggest environmental threat to health in Europe. However, in 1990, the number of premature deaths attributable to her was still one million.
Second is noise pollution, which causes 12,000 premature deaths, according to the report. The effects of climate change are also increasingly influencing, for example heat waves and floods. People in urban settings are particularly affected by the consequences of climate change, said Catherine Ganzleben of the EEA. Other factors mentioned by the Environment Agency are chemical compounds, resistance to pathogens resulting from overuse of antibiotics, and contaminated drinking water.
Also striking is the clear difference between Eastern and Western European countries. In many Eastern European countries, the rate of premature deaths from environmental factors is much higher than in Western Europe. Bosnia and Herzegovina (27 percent) had the highest proportion of pollution-related deaths, and Iceland and Norway (9 percent) the lowest. Therefore, the situation in Germany is also comparatively good.
The studies are based on data from the World Health Organization (WHO) on causes of death and illness from 2012. According to this, around 13 percent of annual deaths in the EU, the equivalent of 630,000 premature deaths, are can be attributed to environmental factors and therefore would be avoidable. The most common causes of death include cancer, heart disease, and stroke.
