Coronavirus patients in areas that had high levels of air pollution before the pandemic are more likely to die from the infection than patients in cleaner parts of the country, according to a new nationwide study that offers the first clear link between long-term exposure to pollution and Covid-19 death rates.
by Anwar A. Khan
Can the coronavirus disease spread through air?
The international news reports say the virus that causes COVID-19 is mainly transmitted through droplets generated when an infected person coughs, sneezes, or speaks. These droplets are too heavy to hang in the air. They quickly fall on floors or surfaces. You can be infected by breathing in the virus if you are within one metre of a person who has COVID-19, or by touching a contaminated surface and then touching your eyes, nose or mouth before washing your hands.
People can catch COVID-19 from others who have the virus. The disease can spread from person to person through small droplets from the nose or mouth which are spread when a person with COVID-19 coughs or exhales. These droplets land on objects and surfaces around the person. Other people then catch COVID-19 by touching these objects or surfaces, then touching their eyes, nose or mouth. People can also catch COVID-19 if they breathe in droplets from a person with COVID-19 who coughs out or exhales droplets. This is why, it is important to stay more than 1 meter (3 feet) away from a person who is sick.
Air pollution has dropped to unprecedented levels across the world as major cities and countries impose lockdown measures to curb the spread of the coronavirus.
As humans stay inside, the environment is temporarily changing: wild animals are roaming the streets and some typically smog-filled skies are clear.
Despite the rare glimpse of natural beauty like snow-crested mountains and clearer skylines, scientists warn against celebrating any short-term benefits from the air pollution drop as levels will rebound once global restrictions lift.
More than 2.6 million cases of Covid-19 and about 200 thousand hundred deaths have been documented worldwide, according to Johns Hopkins University.
People in Punjab, India say they can see the snow peaks of the Himalayas, a view that for decades has been blocked by air pollution. New Delhi alone has recorded a 60% drop in fine particulate matter, the world’s deadliest air pollutant.
Los Angeles, the traffic-congested city with some of the highest smog levels in the U.S., has seen nitrogen levels drop significantly and rush-hour traffic essentially vanish.
Despite the rare glimpse of natural beauty like snow-crested mountains and clearer skylines, scientists warn against celebrating any short-term benefits from the decline in air pollution since levels will rebound once global restrictions lift.
The Langtang range is visible from Kathmandu during the sixth day the nationwide coronavirus lockdown in Nepal on March 29. The restrictions have decreased air pollution in Kathmandu Valley, which consistently ranks among the most polluted areas in the world.
The India Gate war memorial shows the memorial after air pollution levels began to drop during the lockdown in New Delhi on April 8.
Smog has cleared up over downtown Los Angeles during the coronavirus pandemic on April 17. The skyline is usually obscured by air pollution, but nitrogen levels have plummeted in the city since the beginning of quarantine.
Traffic plummeted on highways in Los Angeles once the virus restrictions were imposed at midnight on March 20.
In Philippines’ capital city, fine particulate matter, the world’s deadliest air pollutant dropped by 180% since quarantine measures were imposed in Metro Manila on March 16, according to the Environmental Pollution Studies Laboratory of the Institute of Environmental Science and Meteorology.
Satellite imagery distributed by the European Space Agency shows the decline in average nitrogen dioxide concentrations from air pollution across Spain from March 14 to March 25. Clearer skies are found in Paris. The Eiffel Tower is seen clearly from the Parisian suburb of Saint-Cloud on April 22.
Coronavirus patients in areas that had high levels of air pollution before the pandemic are more likely to die from the infection than patients in cleaner parts of the country, according to a new nationwide study that offers the first clear link between long-term exposure to pollution and Covid-19 death rates.
In an analysis of 3,080 counties in the United States, researchers at the Harvard University T.H. Chan School of Public Health found that higher levels of the tiny, dangerous particles in air known as PM 2.5 were associated with higher death rates from the disease.
For weeks, public health officials have surmised a link between dirty air and death or serious illness from Covid-19, which is caused by the coronavirus. The Harvard analysis is the first nationwide study to show a statistical link, revealing a “large overlap” between Covid-19 deaths and other diseases associated with long-term exposure to fine particulate matter.
“The results of this paper suggest that long-term exposure to air pollution increases vulnerability to experiencing the most severe Covid-19 outcomes,” the authors wrote.
The paper found that if Manhattan had lowered its average particulate matter level by just a single unit, or one microgram per cubic meter, over the past 20 years, the borough would most likely have seen 248 fewer Covid-19 deaths by this point in the outbreak.
Over all, the research could have significant implications for how public health officials choose to allocate resources like ventilators and respirators as the coronavirus spreads. The paper has been submitted for peer review and publication in the New England Journal of Medicine.
It found that just a slight increase in long-term pollution exposure could have serious coronavirus-related consequences, even accounting for other factors like smoking rates and population density.
For example, it found that a person living for decades in a county with high levels of fine particulate matter is 15 percent more likely to die from the coronavirus than someone in a region with one unit less of the fine particulate pollution.
The District of Columbia, for instance, is likely to have a higher death rate than the adjacent Montgomery County, Md. Cook County, Ill., which includes Chicago, should be worse than nearby Lake County, Ill. Fulton County, Ga., which includes Atlanta, is likely to suffer more deaths than the adjacent Douglas County.
From the Bay Area to New Delhi, explores air pollution around the world. “This study provides evidence that counties that have more polluted air will experience higher risks of death for Covid-19,” said Francesca Dominici, a professor of biostatistics at Harvard who led the study.
Counties with higher pollution levels, Dr. Dominici said, “will be the ones that will have higher numbers of hospitalizations, higher numbers of deaths and where many of the resources should be concentrated.”
The study is part of a small but growing body of research, mostly still out of Europe, that offers a view into how a lifetime of breathing dirtier air can make people more susceptible to the coronavirus, which has already killed more than 50,000 people in the United States and about 200,000 worldwide.
In the short term, Dr. Dominici and other public health experts said the study’s finding meant that places like the Central Valley of California, or Cuyahoga County, Ohio, may need to prepare for more severe cases of Covid-19.
The analysis did not look at individual patient data and did not answer why some parts of the country have been hit harder than others. It also remains unclear whether particulate matter pollution plays any role in the spread of the coronavirus or whether long-term exposure directly leads to a greater risk of falling ill.
Dr. John R. Balmes, a spokesman for the American Lung Association and a professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco, said the findings were particularly important for hospitals in poor neighborhoods and communities of color, which tend to be exposed to higher levels of air pollution than affluent, white communities.
“We need to make sure that hospitals taking care of folks who are more vulnerable and with even greater air pollution exposure have the resources they need,” Dr. Balmes said.
As more is learned about the recurrence of Covid-19, the study also could have far-reaching implications for clean-air regulations, which the country has worked to roll back over the past three years on the grounds that they have been onerous to industry.
“The study results underscore the importance of continuing to enforce existing air pollution regulations to protect human health both during and after the Covid-19 crisis,” the study said.
The Bangladesh government should give a serious thought on our existing air pollution and take necessary measures to disinfect air pollution before lifting the present lock-down which is now going in the country.
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The writer is an independent political observer based in Dhaka, Bangladesh who writes on politics, political and human-centred figures, current and international affairs.
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