Air Pollution

There is no Disease Outbreak data at this time

Air pollution is contamination of the indoor or outdoor environment by any chemical, physical or biological agent that modifies the natural characteristics of the atmosphere. Household combustion devices, motor vehicles, industrial facilities and forest fires are common sources of air pollution. Pollutants of major public health concern include particulate matter, carbon monoxide, ozone, nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide. Outdoor and indoor air pollution cause respiratory and other diseases, which can be fatal.

Key facts

3.8 million people a year die prematurely from illness attributable to the household air pollution caused by the inefficient use of solid fuels and kerosene for cooking. Among these 3.8 million deaths:

27% are due to pneumonia
18% from stroke
27% from ischaemic heart disease
20% from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD)
8% from lung cancer.

Pneumonia
Exposure to household air pollution almost doubles the risk for childhood pneumonia and is responsible for 45% of all pneumonia deaths in children less than 5 years old. Household air pollution is also risk for acute lower respiratory infections (pneumonia) in adults, and contributes to 28% of all adult deaths to pneumonia.

Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
One in four or 25% of premature deaths from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in adults in low- and middle-income countries are due to exposure to household air pollution. Women exposed to high levels of indoor smoke are more than two times as likely to suffer from COPD than women who use cleaner fuels and technologies. Among men (who already have a heightened risk of COPD due to their higher rates of smoking), exposure to household air pollution nearly doubles that risk.

Stroke
12% of all premature deaths due to stroke can be attributed to the daily exposure to household air pollution arising from cooking with solid fuels and kerosene.

Ischaemic heart disease
Approximately 11% of all deaths due to ischaemic heart disease, accounting for over a million premature deaths annually, can be attributed to exposure to household air pollution.

Lung cancer
Approximately 17% of premature lung cancer deaths in adults are attributable to exposure to carcinogens from household air pollution caused by cooking with kerosene or solid fuels like wood, charcoal or coal. The risk for women is higher, due to their role in food preparation.

Other health impacts and risks
More generally, small particulate matter and other pollutants in indoor smoke inflame the airways and lungs, impairing immune response and reducing the oxygen-carrying capacity of the blood.

There is also evidence of links between household air pollution and low birth weight, tuberculosis, cataract, nasopharyngeal and laryngeal cancers.

Mortality from ischaemic heart disease and stroke are also affected by risk factors such as high blood pressure, unhealthy diet, lack of physical activity and smoking. Some other risks for childhood pneumonia include suboptimal breastfeeding, underweight and second-hand smoke. For lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, active smoking and second-hand tobacco smoke are also main risk factors.

WHO provides technical support to countries in their own evaluations and scale-up of health-promoting household fuels and technologies. WHO is building capacity at the country and regional level to address household air pollution through direct consultations and workshops on household energy and health. This is further complemented by the ongoing development of the Clean Household Energy Solutions Toolkit (CHEST) to support the implementation of WHO Guidelines for indoor air quality: household fuel combustion. CHEST is a suite of tools and information resources that help countries identify stakeholders working on household energy and/or public health to design, implement and monitor policies addressing household energy.

Guidelines for indoor air quality: household fuel combustion

To ensure healthy air in and around the home, WHO’s Guidelines for indoor air quality: household fuel combustion provide health-based recommendations on the types of fuels and technologies to protect health as well as strategies for the effective dissemination and adoption of such home energy technologies. These build upon existing WHO outdoor air quality guidelines and WHO guidance on levels of specific indoor pollutants.

Household energy database

The WHO Household energy database is used to monitor global progress in the transition to cleaner fuels and stove combinations in households. It also supports assessments of disease burden from the household air pollution generated from the use of polluting fuel and technologies. Currently the database includes housing data from more than 1100 surveys, representing 157 countries. It has been expanded to include information on household fuels and technologies used for heating and lighting.

As the custodial agency for Sustainable Development Goal Indicator 3.9.1 (mortality rate from the joint effects of household and ambient air pollution) and 7.1.2 (population with primary reliance on clean fuels and technologies), WHO uses the Household energy database to derive estimates for tracking progress towards achieving universal clean energy access and related health impacts.

Research and programme evaluation

WHO is working with countries, researchers and other partners to harmonize methods of evaluation across settings so that health impacts are assessed consistently and rigorously and incorporate economic assessment of health benefits.

Leadership and advocacy in the health, energy and climate community

Health sector
In May 2015, the World Health Assembly unanimously adopted a resolution on air pollution and health, calling for the integration of health concerns into national, regional and local air pollution-related policies. The following year, the World Health Assembly adopted a “Roadmap for Enhanced Action,” calling for increased cross-sector cooperation to address the health risks of air pollution.

Building on this mandate, WHO is working to integrate guidance and resources for supporting clean household energy into global health initiatives and decision-support tools, such as the Global Action Plan for Pneumonia and Diarrheal Disease (GAPPD), or Global Strategy for Women and Children’s Health, as well as into other aspects of WHO's own health policy guidance. WHO emphasizes the compelling health arguments for cleaner household energy in a range of global forums addressing maternal and child health issues related to pneumonia as well as forums concerned with noncommunicable diseases. This advocacy can help increase awareness of the importance of providing and scaling up of cleaner household energy as a core preventive public health measure.

Health and climate change
WHO is a partner of the Climate and Clean Air Coalition to Reduce Short-Lived Climate Pollutants (CCAC). As a member of the CCAC’s health task force, WHO is providing technical support for harnessing health benefits from actions to reduce short-lived climate pollutants, and working to scale up health sector engagement to address such pollutants and improve air quality.

Health, energy and sustainable development
Reductions in air pollution-related disease burden (both for household and outdoor) will be used to monitor the progress towards attaining the Sustainable Development Goal on Health (SDG 3).

Ensuring universal access to clean fuel and technologies is a target of the Sustainable Development Goal on energy (SDG 7). Achieving this goal could prevent millions of deaths and improve the health and well-being of the billions of people relying on polluting technologies and fuels for cooking, heating and lighting.

To better assess the health risks of household energy use, as well as differentiated gender impacts from household energy practices, WHO is leading an effort with countries and surveying agencies (e.g. USAID’s DHS, UNICEF’S MICS, World Bank’s LSMS) to enhance, harmonize and pilot questions for national censuses and surveys. The effort will ensure that surveys better capture information on all the fuels and technologies used in the home for cooking, heating and lighting, as well as other impacts like time lost to fuel collection disaggregated by sex.

WHO also supports international initiatives to improve air pollution and related health impacts such as the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves and the Climate Clean Air Coalition.

Background

Outdoor air pollution is a major environmental health problem affecting everyone in developed and developing countries alike.

WHO estimates that in 2012, some 72% of outdoor air pollution-related premature deaths were due to ischaemic heart disease and strokes, while 14% of deaths were due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease or acute lower respiratory infections, and 14% of deaths were due to lung cancer.

Some deaths may be attributed to more than one risk factor at the same time. For example, both smoking and ambient air pollution affect lung cancer. Some lung cancer deaths could have been averted by improving ambient air quality, or by reducing tobacco smoking.

A 2013 assessment by WHO’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) concluded that outdoor air pollution is carcinogenic to humans, with the particulate matter component of air pollution most closely associated with increased cancer incidence, especially cancer of the lung. An association also has been observed between outdoor air pollution and increase in cancer of the urinary tract/bladder.

Ambient (outdoor air pollution) in both cities and rural areas was estimated to cause 3 million premature deaths worldwide per year in 2012; this mortality is due to exposure to small particulate matter of 10 microns or less in diameter (PM₁₀), which cause cardiovascular and respiratory disease, and cancers.

People living in low- and middle-income countries disproportionately experience the burden of outdoor air pollution with 87% (of the 3 million premature deaths) occurring in low- and middle-income countries, and the greatest burden in the WHO Western Pacific and South-East Asia regions. The latest burden estimates reflect the very significant role air pollution plays in cardiovascular illness and premature deaths – much more so than was previously understood by scientists.

Most sources of outdoor air pollution are well beyond the control of individuals and demand action by cities, as well as national and international policymakers in sector like transport, energy waste management, buildings and agriculture.

There are many examples of successful policies in transport, urban planning, power generation and industry that reduce air pollution:

for industry: clean technologies that reduce industrial smokestack emissions; improved management of urban and agricultural waste, including capture of methane gas emitted from waste sites as an alternative to incineration (for use as biogas);
for transport: shifting to clean modes of power generation; prioritizing rapid urban transit, walking and cycling networks in cities as well as rail interurban freight and passenger travel; shifting to cleaner heavy duty diesel vehicles and low-emissions vehicles and fuels, including fuels with reduced sulfur content;
for urban planning: improving the energy efficiency of buildings and making cities more compact, and thus energy efficient;
for power generation: increased use of low-emissions fuels and renewable combustion-free power sources (like solar, wind or hydropower); co-generation of heat and power; and distributed energy generation (e.g. mini-grids and rooftop solar power generation);
for municipal and agricultural waste management: strategies for waste reduction, waste separation, recycling and reuse or waste reprocessing; as well as improved methods of biological waste management such as anaerobic waste digestion to produce biogas, are feasible, low cost alternatives to the open incineration of solid waste. Where incineration is unavoidable, then combustion technologies with strict emission controls are critical.

In addition to outdoor air pollution, indoor smoke is a serious health risk for some 3 billion people who cook and heat their homes with biomass fuels and coal. Some 4.3 million premature deaths were attributable to household air pollution in 2012. Almost all of that burden was in low-middle-income countries as well.

The 2005 "WHO Air quality guidelines" offer global guidance on thresholds and limits for key air pollutants that pose health risks. The Guidelines indicate that by reducing particulate matter (PM₁₀) pollution from 70 to 20 micrograms per cubic metre (μg/m), we can cut air pollution-related deaths by around 15%.

The Guidelines apply worldwide and are based on expert evaluation of current scientific evidence for:

particulate matter (PM)
ozone (O₃)
nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) and
sulfur dioxide (SO₂), in all WHO regions.

Particulate matter

Definition and principal sources

PM affects more people than any other pollutant. The major components of PM are sulfate, nitrates, ammonia, sodium chloride, black carbon, mineral dust and water. It consists of a complex mixture of solid and liquid particles of organic and inorganic substances suspended in the air. The most health-damaging particles are those with a diameter of 10 microns or less, (≤ PM₁₀), which can penetrate and lodge deep inside the lungs. Chronic exposure to particles contributes to the risk of developing cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, as well as of lung cancer.

Air quality measurements are typically reported in terms of daily or annual mean concentrations of PM₁₀ particles per cubic meter of air volume (m³). Routine air quality measurements typically describe such PM concentrations in terms of micrograms per cubic meter (μg/m³). When sufficiently sensitive measurement tools are available, concentrations of fine particles (PM_2.5 or smaller), are also reported.

PM_2.5
10 μg/m³ annual mean
25 μg/m³ 24-hour mean

PM₁₀
20 μg/m³ annual mean
50 μg/m³ 24-hour mean

In addition to guideline values, the Air Quality Guidelines provide interim targets for concentrations of PM₁₀ and PM_2.5 aimed at promoting a gradual shift from high to lower concentrations.

If these interim targets were to be achieved, significant reductions in risks for acute and chronic health effects from air pollution can be expected. Progress towards the guideline values, however, should be the ultimate objective.

The effects of PM on health occur at levels of exposure currently being experienced by many people both in urban and rural areas and in developed and developing countries – although exposures in many fast-developing cities today are often far higher than in developed cities of comparable size.

"WHO Air Quality Guidelines" estimate that reducing annual average particulate matter (PM₁₀) concentrations from levels of 70 μg/m³, common in many developing cities, to the WHO guideline level of 20 μg/m³, could reduce air pollution-related deaths by around 15%. However, even in the European Union, where PM concentrations in many cities do comply with Guideline levels, it is estimated that average life expectancy is 8.6 months lower than it would otherwise be, due to PM exposures from human sources.

In developing countries, indoor exposure to pollutants from the household combustion of solid fuels on open fires or traditional stoves increases the risk of acute lower respiratory infections and associated mortality among young children; indoor air pollution from solid fuel use is also a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and lung cancer among adults.

There are serious risks to health not only from exposure to PM, but also from exposure to ozone (O₃), nitrogen dioxide (NO₂) and sulfur dioxide (SO₂). As with PM, concentrations are often highest largely in the urban areas of low- and middle-income countries. Ozone is a major factor in asthma morbidity and mortality, while nitrogen dioxide and sulfur dioxide also can play a role in asthma, bronchial symptoms, lung inflammation and reduced lung function.