One in five deaths in India can be attributed to air pollution, according to Lancet study

Morning haze envelops the skyline on the outskirts of New Delhi

As many as one in five deaths recorded in India last year can be attributed to air pollution, according to a study in The Lancet, with 1.7 million fatalities recorded in 2019.

Most residents of India’s megacities cannot afford air purifiers or to regularly purchase N95 masks which filter out harmful particles. 

Instead, they breathe in the heavily toxic air every day, which can have a variety of adverse impacts on their health.

According to The Lancet study, lung disease is the most common cause of death but pollution has also caused rising levels of fatal heart disease, strokes and diabetes. 

Indians took to social media to point out that air pollution was a “hidden pandemic” — killing more than ten times the number of people than Covid-19 — but the issue was being ignored.

“Air pollution causes direct damage to the airways of the respiratory system by damaging the fine hair-like structures which keep them clean, by, clearing secretions, particles, and infective organisms,” said Dr Sumit Ray, the Head of Department in Critical Care Medicine in Holy Family Hospital in Delhi.

Smog obscured buildings in Mumbai

Credit: DIVYAKANT SOLANKI/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock 

“This leads to an increased propensity to get lung infections and an inability to clear those infections.” 

India is home to 21 out of the world’s 30 most polluted cities and the Air Quality Index in its capital of New Delhi exceeded 1,300 in November, over twenty times the World Health Organization’s safe limit.

While the study found indoor or household pollution has fallen in India since 1990, largely through a reduction in the burning of wood in cooking and heating homes, the death rate from outside or ambient air pollution increased by 115 per cent.

India’s economy has been one of the fastest-growing in the world over the past decade, lifting at least 270 million people out of poverty since 2005 — but this rapid growth has largely been powered by burning cheap fossil fuels.

India uses more non-renewable energy than any other country besides China and the US and relies particularly on coal.

But the report by The Lancet found air pollution is having an adverse impact on economic growth as premature deaths caused by toxic air reduced India’s GDP by 1.4 per cent, or £27.4 billion, in 2019.

Over 50,000 new vehicles are being registered for use on India’s roads every day, while waste burning also emits harmful greenhouse gases.

New Delhi, home to approximately 30 million people, is the world’s most polluted capital city, and the toxic air there peaks during the winter after thousands of farmers in surrounding states burn their crop stubble.

Politicians in New Delhi have been criticised for continuing to prioritise economic growth over the health of their residents, with air pollution now reducing the life expectancy of a life-long resident by over nine years.