BLOGS

Exercise is good for you? Not if you plan to cycle to work in Allahabad in India or Zabrol in Iran. The amount of air pollutants in these cities is so huge that inhaling this during 30 minutes of cycling activities does more harm to your body than good, according to an international study authored by experts from the UK, Switzerland, Spain and Brazil.
According to the study, breathing polluted air can cause infections like pneumonia, stroke, ischemic heart disease and some cancers. In fact, the Global Burden of Disease, published by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation ranks air pollution as among the top risk factors for poor health.
The study measured air quality through average annual levels of PM2.5, the tiny pollutant particles that can get embedded in your lungs .These PM2.5 particles can occur both naturally-through dust storms or forest fires or through man-made sources like motor vehicles and manufacturing process emissions.
The study said that people who commute to work on cycles in cities where the annual background levels of PM2.5 levels is 160 micrograms per cubic meter  will pass the breakeven point at just 30 minutes a day.
On the other hand, cities like London, Paris and New York have never crossed the limit where the air pollutants negatives have outweighed the positives.
Though this study highlights how continuous exposure to outdoor air pollution can be detrimental to our health, it does not consider the health impacts of short term increases in PM2.5 particulate matter, or sheds light on the effects of other pollutants like PM10 particulates, nitrogen oxides from diesel cars or  the effects of a shrinking ozone layer.
Whatever be the reasons, through this study we now know how important it is for us to breathe clean air outdoors for our health and how important it is for local governments to act quickly to arrest the increase of air pollutants.