Scientists have linked two major air pollutants with mortality rates increased in 12 European cities. The findings, published in the issue of tomorrow British Medical Journal , are sure to fuel a contentious debate in Europe and the United States on proposed standards that greatly reduce exposure to air pollutants.
An international team led by Klea Katsouyanni of the University of Athens analyzed the daily fluctuations in the levels of two pollutants - sulfur dioxide and particulates - and mortality rates in cities. They found that the average increase of 50 micrograms per cubic meter either sulfur dioxide or black smoke (small particles) on a given day was associated with an average increase of 3% of deaths in western European cities studied - Athens, Barcelona, Cologne, London, Lyon, Milan and Paris. Such levels of pollutants, however, have been linked to a lower increase in mortality rates in the cities of Eastern Europe and Central Bratislava, Krakow, Lodz, Poznan and Wroclaw sulfur dioxide is linked to increased 0.8% of deaths, and the black smoke she gave up 0.6%.
we do not know why people in Eastern and Central Europe, with higher levels of pollution means, seem to be less exposed to daily increases in air pollution. "It was not an effect we expected," said Katsouyanni. One possibility, she and other experts speculate, is that older people are more vulnerable to the adverse effects of air pollution and because Europeans East have an expected shorter life, their cities are less at risk.
the regional difference is treated in other studies on air pollution and health of the European Union . A European project approach
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