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Reducing China's air pollution may prevent about 900,000 cardiovascular deaths by 2030: study

Xinhua, November 11, 2015 Adjust font size:

Lowering air pollution to the 2008 Beijing Olympics level could prevent about 900,000 cardiovascular deaths in urban China by 2030, a study said Tuesday.

To guarantee clean air for the 2008 Olympics, China temporarily closed factories, construction sites and limited auto traffic in Beijing.

In the new study, researchers from Beijing's Fuwai Hospital and other research agencies simulated two air quality improvement scenarios from 2015 to 2030, each achieved gradually over 10 years.

One simulation was of the air quality during the 2008 Beijing Olympics, which was a fine particle matter (PM2.5) level of 55 micrograms per cubic meter. The other was of the World Health Organization's recommendation of 10 micrograms per cubic meter.

For comparison, they also projected the effect of a 50 percent reduction in active and secondhand smoking and lowering systolic high blood pressure to 140 millimeters of mercury, each over 5 years.

They found achieving the 2008 Olympic air quality level would reduce stroke deaths by 2.7 percent and coronary heart disease deaths by 7.2 percent in urban China, including Beijing, from 2015 to 2030. That means 304,000 stroke deaths, 619,000 coronary heart disease deaths would be prevented in the next 15 years.

But the Olympics scenario would only gain life-years on the order of about a third of that projected for a 50 percent smoking reduction, and a fourth of that projected for systolic hypertension control, they said.

The more aggressive World Health Organization pollution goal, however, would yield greater life year gains than either tobacco or systolic blood pressure control.

"Air pollution is a leading cardiovascular risk factor in Beijing and all urban China," the researchers concluded in their paper. "We projected that lowering air pollution to Beijing Olympics level could prevent about 900,000 cardiovascular deaths and gain about 4.2 million life years in urban China by 2030."

The findings were presented Tuesday at the American Heart Association's annual scientific meeting in Orlando, Florida. Enditem