Photo: Fredy Martinez | Unsplash
With most people spending more if not all their time at home during this pandemic, air pollution (calculated by measuring levels of nitrogen dioxide and tiny particle matter) has significantly decreased. A study in Europe has found that this unexpected benefit has prevented approximately 11,000 deaths in Europe. The largest percentage of that would've been from heart failure, followed by lung ailments, strokes and cancer, respectively. Europe has also seen fewer children developing asthma and fewer emergency room visits and preterm births during this time. Once we manage to emerge from this pandemic, the author questions whether we as a society can figure out how to maintain lower levels of pollution than what we were used to before this all started.
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