Pollution harms, makes people dumb

The effect is worse for the elderly, especially those over 64, and for those with low education

Shocking new research suggests air pollution has a serious impact on mental capabilities as well as physical health in human beings.

High levels of pollution can trigger a decrease in language and arithmetic skills — with the average impact of ‘ dirty air’ equivalent to losing a year in education.

The United Nations has blamed air pollution for seven million deaths worldwide each year, while campaigners have urged local government to take more action.

Air pollution causes a ‘ huge’ reduction in intelligence, according to a new study. Earlier this month it was revealed London's pollution is now so bad it's equivalent to smoking 251 cigarettes

An international team of researchers led by Beijing Normal University analysed language and arithmetic tests conducted on 20,000 people across China between 2010 and 2014.

However, the study is relevant worldwide, as the latest figures show around 95 per cent of the global population are now breathing unsafe air.

Scientists conducted the tests across China in areas with varied levels of pollution.

According to the latest findings, air pollution is a significant cause of loss of intelligence — roughly equating to one year of a person's education.

Although previous research had found air pollution is capable of harming cognitive performance in students, this latest study is the first to examine people of all ages.

It also analysed the difference between men and women.

“Polluted air can cause everyone to reduce their level of education by one year, which is huge,” researcher Xi Chen of Yale School of Public Health told the Guardian.

“But we know the effect is worse for the elderly, especially those over 64, and for men, and for those with low education. If we calculate [ the loss] for those, it may be a few years of education,” he said.

Worse still, the researchers found that the longer people are exposed to dirty air, the greater the damage to their intelligence levels.

“We find that long- term exposure to air pollution impedes cognitive performance in verbal and math tests,” researchers wrote in their paper, published

in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“We provide evidence that the effect of air pollution on verbal tests becomes more pronounced as people age, especially for men and the less educated. The damage on the ageing brain by air pollution likely imposes substantial health and economic costs, considering that cognitive functioning is critical for the elderly for both running daily errands and making high- stake decisions'.

For the latest study, scientists accounted for the gradual decline in cognition seen as people age.

They also ruled out the possibility that people are more impatient or uncooperative during tests when the pollution levels were especially high.

It is now believed more than 80 per cent of the world's population breathes in polluted air. The longer people are exposed to dirty air the greater the damage to their intelligence

Plastic pollution has also become so widespread that we may be inhaling up to 130 tiny pieces a day, research found.

Fibres from fleece and polyester clothing and particles from urban dust and car tyres are the biggest sources of socalled microplastics in the air.

Microplastics are small plastic pellets ranging in size from 0.5 millimetres that have accumulated in the marine environment following decades of pollution. They include polyester fibres generated from laundry

The tiny specks are lighter than air and could cause asthma, heart disease and auto- immune conditions, the research, published in December 2017, found.

The study, a review of a number of recent plastics studies, revealed washing a single polyester garment can produce 1,900 plastic fibres.

The study's author, Dr Joana Correia Prata, of Fernando Pessoa University in Portugal, said: “The evidence suggests that an individual's lungs could be exposed to between 26 and 130 airborne microplastics a day, which would pose a risk for human health, especially in susceptible individuals, including children.

“Exposure may cause asthma, cardiac disease, allergies and autoimmune diseases.”