研究发现，空气污染“大流行”每年导致近900万人过早死亡

研究发现，空气污染“大流行”每年导致近900万人过早死亡

Global air pollution causes millions of early deaths every year in what researchers are calling an “air pollution pandemic”. On average, people may expect to see a shortened lifespan of about three years, making man-made pollution more deadly than wars, smoking, and other potentially fatal diseases.

全球空气污染每年导致数百万人过早死亡，研究人员称之为“空气污染大流行”。平均而言，人们预期寿命将缩短约3年，这使得人为污染比战争、吸烟和其他可能致命的疾病更致命。

Last year marked the first time in a decade that pollution was found to increase in the US despite evidence that cutting pollution saves lives. A growing body of evidence suggests that pollution is not only responsible for an increased risk of death, but also linked to brain atrophy, cancer, and memory loss as well as mental health conditions like depression and suicide. Particulate matter has been found in the placenta of pregnant women and is believed to increase the risk of “silent” miscarriage. It’s even connected to balding.

尽管有证据表明，减少污染可以挽救生命，但去年美国的污染水平10年来首次出现上升。越来越多的证据表明，污染不仅是死亡风险增加的原因，还与脑萎缩、癌症、失忆以及抑郁症和自杀等心理健康状况有关。在孕妇的胎盘中发现了颗粒物，据信会增加“无声流产”的风险。它甚至与秃顶有关。

In 2015 alone, air pollution caused an extra 8.8 million premature deaths, write researchers with the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry and the University Medical Centre Mainz in Cardiovascular Research. By comparison, smoking shortens life expectancy by an average of 2.2 years, killing around 7.2 million people each year. HIV/AIDS is responsible for around 1 million deaths, while parasitic and vector-borne diseases like malaria result in around 600,000 deaths. All forms of violence and wars kill even less – 530,000 people.

马克斯普朗克化学研究所和美因茨大学医学中心心血管研究的研究人员写道，仅2015年一年，空气污染就造成了另外880万人过早死亡。相比之下，吸烟平均缩短了2.2岁的寿命，每年约有720万人死于吸烟。艾滋病毒/艾滋病造成约100万人死亡，而疟疾等寄生虫和病媒传播疾病造成约60万人死亡。所有形式的暴力和战争造成的死亡更少——53万人。

“We show that about two-thirds of premature deaths are attributable to human-made air pollution, mainly from fossil fuel use; this goes up to 80 percent in high-income countries. Five and a half million deaths worldwide a year are potentially avoidable,” said Thomas Münzel in a statement. If air pollution was reduced by removing fossil fuel emissions, the researchers add that improved air quality could add up to 1 year of life in just over a year. If all human-made emissions were removed, people could see nearly two additional years.

“我们发现，约三分之二的过早死亡是由人类造成的空气污染造成的，主要来自化石燃料的使用;在高收入国家，这一比例高达80%。全世界每年有550万人死亡是可以避免的。如果通过减少化石燃料的排放来减少空气污染，研究人员补充说，改善的空气质量可以在一年多一点的时间里增加1年的寿命。如果所有的人为排放都被移除，人们可以看到将近两年的额外时间。

To determine how air pollution impacts six types of respiratory and blood-related diseases, the team used exposure data from various sources of air pollution and applied it to previous work analyzing global exposure and death rates and to data from the Global Burden of Disease. Human-made air pollution was distinguished from naturally sourced pollutants such as wildfire emissions.

为了确定空气污染如何影响六种与呼吸和血液相关的疾病，研究小组使用了来自各种空气污染来源的暴露数据，并将其应用于之前分析全球暴露和死亡率的工作，以及来自全球疾病负担的数据。人为造成的空气污染与自然产生的污染物如野火排放是不同的。

Heat map showing years of life lost each year from air pollution. Cardiovascular Research

Cardiovascular diseases like heart and cerebrovascular disease combined were the most likely to shorten lives, resulting in a 43 percent loss in life expectancy around the world. Air pollution was also shown to disproportionately impact children under the age of five in low-income countries, as well as older people – three-quarters of deaths attributed to air pollution occurred in people over 60.

心脑血管疾病是最有可能缩短寿命的疾病，导致全球预期寿命下降43%。空气污染对低收入国家5岁以下儿童和老年人的影响也不成比例——空气污染导致的死亡有四分之三发生在60岁以上的人群中。

"It is remarkable that both the number of deaths and the loss in life expectancy from air pollution rival the effect of tobacco smoking and are much higher than other causes of death. Air pollution exceeds malaria as a global cause of premature death by a factor of 19; it exceeds violence by a factor of 16, HIV/AIDS by a factor of 9, alcohol by a factor of 45, and drug abuse by a factor of 60,” said study author Jos Lelieveld.

“值得注意的是，空气污染造成的死亡人数和预期寿命下降与吸烟的影响相当，而且远远高于其他死因。”空气污染导致全球过早死亡的因素比疟疾多19倍;它比暴力高出16倍，比艾滋病毒/艾滋病高出9倍，比酒精高出45倍，比毒品滥用高出60倍，”研究作者Jos Lelieveld说。

The researchers say that it is the first study to determine how air pollution impacts specific deaths at various ages and across regions.

研究人员表示，这是首次确定空气污染如何影响不同年龄和不同地区的特定死亡的研究。

“We believe our results show there is an 'air pollution pandemic'. Policy-makers and the medical community should be paying much more attention to this. Both air pollution and smoking are preventable, but over the past decades much less attention has been paid to air pollution than to smoking, especially among cardiologists,” said Münzel, adding that air pollution measures should be included in national guidelines just like other preventable diseases.

“我们相信，我们的研究结果表明存在‘空气污染大流行’。决策者和医学界应该对此给予更多的关注。空气污染和吸烟都是可以预防的，但在过去的几十年里，人们对空气污染的关注远远少于吸烟，尤其是在心脏病专家中。Münzel补充说，空气污染措施应该像其他可预防的疾病一样被纳入国家指导方针。

Age distribution of excess mortality from air pollution. Cardiovascular Research