Some 95% of the world's population is known to breathe unsafe air. That problem is particularly acute in China, whose air pollution has been shown to be three times greater than the upper limits described by the UN's World Health Organization; which is why the Yale study was conducted there. The researchers demonstrated that air pollution caused a significant drop in test scores—particularly in language and math—creating the equivalent of a lost year in the average person's education.
So now we have further evidence of the health-damaging impact of air pollution. What do these results mean? How great is this threat? What should we do about it? Of course, the rational conclusion would be to take dramatic and immediate measures to reduce air pollution. Don't hold your breath, however (no intentional pun, here). Since most all forms of pollution and environmental degradation disproportionately impact the poor, we can't expect politicians—who owe so much to the rich—to do much of anything about the problem.
In related areas, very little has been done to slow global warming or the use of pesticides, so we can't expect much to be done about air pollution either. Politicians seem to be minimally concerned about the future, since the impact of their actions—harmful or helpful—often takes many years to bear fruit. Their attention is on the next quarter's bottom line, and their chances of getting reelected, not on distant events to come.
So what will the future bring, if air pollution persists? Are we doomed? Will we be getting increasingly dumber? What harm will we incur as a species, if we don't act? No one knows the answers to these questions.
Well, there's one thing that can be counted on: the pharmaceutical industry will swing into action by developing drugs to deal with the curtailed cognitive symptoms—especially if those drugs need to be taken for the rest of one's life (thereby ensuring continued income for big pharma). Our culture is good at treating symptoms—rather than root causes. We already know that citizens' lungs get messed up with air pollution, so big pharma has answered the call by developing inhalers. Similarly, we have medicines to treat diabetes and heart disease—all aimed at easing the pain and limitations of these problems, without the need to improve lifestyles. Drug companies make lots of money when industry makes people sick.
So, will big pharma come up with medications to counter the brain damage caused by air pollution? It's a good bet that they will. We already have medications to treat the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease and other brain problems. We can count on the pharmaceutical industry to rescue us from having to do much about air pollution.
I am currently taking an online course on modern diseases and debilitation of old age, which makes another cogent point on this issue. The Dutch professor of my course, a physician, spent a few years in the emergency ward of a hospital, often treating the aftermath of accidents, such as when vehicles collide. He later went into family medicine and often found himself dealing with emergency situations brought on by heart attacks and strokes.
It occurred to him that he was repeatedly faced with health accidents that were brought on, not by a sudden automobile crash, but in the wake of a few decades of unhealthy living. In either case, he was dealing with a calamity—one that either happened in the ER from a crash a few hours earlier, or the other due to a gradual crash over decades. Are we creating a slow-motion crash of brain damage from air pollution—a crash that is as avoidable as heart attacks and diabetes, which could be dealt with by creating a healthy lifestyle?
More on dumbing down next time...
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