The pathogens include those that cause respiratory infections, for example, COVID-19, influenza, measles, MERS, SARS, and tuberculosis, among others. Image for representation.
| Photo Credit: Getty Images

Pathogens that transmit through the air will be described by the term ’infectious respiratory particles’ or IRPs, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). The world health body has thus ended the lack of a common terminology to describe the transmission of these pathogens, which was particularly challenging during the global COVID-19 pandemic. The announcement on Thursday came following wide-ranging consultations across multiple steps in 2021-2023.

“The challenge became particularly evident during the COVID-19 pandemic as experts from various sectors were required to provide scientific and policy guidance. Varying terminologies highlighted gaps in common understanding and contributed to challenges in public communication and efforts to curb the transmission of the pathogen,” the WHO noted.

The pathogens include those that cause respiratory infections, for example, COVID-19, influenza, measles, Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS), Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), and tuberculosis (TB), among others.

In its communication, the WHO said that individuals infected with a respiratory pathogen can generate and expel infectious particles containing the pathogen through their mouth or nose by breathing, talking, singing, spitting, coughing, or sneezing, and these particles should be described with the term IRPs. Also, IRPs exist on a continuous spectrum of sizes, and no single cut-off points should be applied to distinguish smaller from larger particles. 

The WHO said this facilitates moving away from the dichotomy of previously used terms — ‘aerosols’ (generally smaller particles) and ‘droplets’ (generally larger particles).

The WHO has published a global technical consultation report introducing the updated terminology for pathogens that transmit through the air following consultations with public health agencies and experts. The publication titled ‘Global technical consultation report on proposed terminology for pathogens that transmit through the air’ is the result of an extensive, multi-year, collaborative effort, and reflects shared agreement on terminology between the WHO, experts, and four major public health agencies — the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention, the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

“Together with a very diverse range of leading public health agencies and experts across multiple disciplines, we are pleased to have been able to address this complex and timely issue and reach a consensus,” Jeremy Farrar, Chief Scientist, WHO, said. “The agreed terminology for pathogens that transmit through the air will help set a new path for research agendas and implementation of public health interventions to identify, communicate and respond to existing and new pathogens,” Dr. Farrar added.

The health agency added that the descriptor ‘through the air’ can be used in a general way to characterise an infectious disease, where the main mode of transmission involves the pathogen travelling through the air or being suspended in the air. Under the umbrella of ‘through the air transmission’, two descriptors can be used — airborne transmission or inhalation, and direct deposition.

“This global technical consultation process was a concerted effort of many influential and experienced experts,” Gagandeep Kang, Christian Medical College, Vellore, and co-chair of the WHO Technical Working Group, said.

The consultation was the first phase of global scientific discussions led by WHO. Next steps include further technical and multidisciplinary research, and exploration of the wider implementation implications of the updated descriptors.

Geneva:

The World Health Organization voiced alarm Thursday at the growing spread of H5N1 bird flu to new species, including humans, who face an “extraordinarily high” mortality rate.

“This remains I think an enormous concern,” the UN health agency’s chief scientist Jeremy Farrar told reporters in Geneva.

The current bird flu outbreak began in 2020 and has led to the deaths of tens of millions of poultry, with wild birds also infected as well as land and marine mammals.

Cows and goats joined the list last month — a surprising development for experts because they were not thought susceptible to this type of influenza.

The A (H5N1) strain has become “a global zoonotic animal pandemic”, Farrar said.

“The great concern of course is that in… infecting ducks and chickens and then increasingly mammals, that virus now evolves and develops the ability to infect humans and then critically the ability to go from human to human.”

So far, there is no evidence that the influenza A(H5N1) virus is spreading between humans.

But in the hundreds of cases where humans have been infected through contact with animals, “the mortality rate is extraordinarily high”, Farrar said.

From the start of 2023 to April 1 this year, the WHO said it had recorded 463 deaths from 889 human cases across 23 countries, putting the case fatality rate at 52 percent.

In a worrying development, US authorities earlier this month said a person in Texas was recovering from bird flu after being exposed to dairy cattle.

It was only the second case of a human testing positive for bird flu in the country, and came after the virus sickened herds that were apparently exposed to wild birds in Texas, Kansas and other states.

It also appears to have been the first human infection with the influenza A(H5N1) virus strain through contact with an infected mammal, WHO said.

When “you come into the mammalian population, then you’re getting closer to humans,” Farrar said, warning that “this virus is just looking for new, novel hosts”.

“It’s a real concern.”

Farrar called for beefing up monitoring, insisting it was “very important understanding how many human infections are happening… because that’s where adaptation (of the virus) will happen”.

“It’s a tragic thing to say, but if I get infected with H5N1 and I die, that’s the end of it. If I go around the community and I spread it to somebody else then you start the cycle.”

He said efforts were under way towards the development of vaccines and therapeutics for H5N1, and stressed the need to ensure that regional and national health authorities around the world have the capacity to diagnose the virus.

This was being done so that “if H5N1 did come across to humans, with human-to-human transmission”, the world would be “in a position to immediately respond”, Farrar said, urging equitable access to vaccines, therapeutics and diagnostics.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Geneva, Switzerland:

Countries thrashing out a historic agreement on tackling future pandemics must use April to bridge their differences because failure cannot be an option, the negotiations co-chair told AFP.

Nations have spent the last two years drafting an international accord on pandemic prevention, preparedness and response, but remain far apart on crucial issues such as vaccine equity and pathogen surveillance.

The planned final round of negotiations therefore missed the target of finishing the accord by Easter to make it ready for adoption by the World Health Organization’s 194 member states at their annual assembly starting on May 27.

Countries will instead return to the WHO headquarters in Geneva for a do-or-die extra round of talks from April 29 to May 10.

Roland Driece, who is co-chairing the negotiations, wants nations to use the time between now and then to climb out of their trenches and find compromises.

“We want them to speak with each other, and not at each other,” the Dutch health diplomat told AFP.

“That’s the biggest challenge we have had: people speaking a lot — they spoke forever — but sometimes it’s not speaking with each other, but telling the other what you find important.

“You need to bridge your differences.”

The main sticking points include sharing access to emerging pathogens, better monitoring of disease outbreaks, reliable financing, and transferring pandemic-fighting technology to poorer countries.

Sharpening minds ahead of the April-May talks, several countries have raised the spectre of another Covid-19, which shredded economies, overturned societies, crippled health systems and killed millions.

Focus and urgency

“Everybody understands that failure is not really an option,” said Driece.

“There’s so many things in the world that require political attention: Ukraine, Gaza, climate change. It’s our duty to keep the focus and the urgency.”

Driece’s Intergovernmental Negotiating Body will draw up a streamlined new draft text by April 18, honing in on areas of common ground.

One European ambassador, frustrated by the process, said success would depend on getting a concise, convergence-oriented document to work from.

“It is about giving the right impulses for better prevention, preparedness and response. It’s not about going into the deepest details on some sort of mechanism,” the diplomat told AFP, on condition of anonymity.

But some NGOs attending the talks fear a bare-bones revised draft will fudge all the tricky topics — and leave the world no less vulnerable to pandemics.

“So mentioning equity, but without the measures” to make it happen, Mohga Kamal-Yanni of the People’s Vaccine Alliance told AFP.

She said rich countries were not offering the financial support for ramped-up pathogen surveillance, nor firm commitments on technology transfer even for publicly funded products or intellectual property rights waivers on tools like vaccines.

“So for God’s sake, what’s left? Maintaining the unequal status that led to what happened during Covid, and before that with HIV,” she said.

The United States said on Friday it was committed to concluding an ambitious accord, with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Health Secretary Xavier Becerra saying American lives and jobs could not be protected “unless we are preventing, detecting, and stopping outbreaks before they reach our shores”.

‘We will not give up’

Alongside the African group, the 31-country Group for Equity has thus far held firm in trying to ensure developing countries are not cut adrift again.

The group wants granting access to pathogens with pandemic potential to be on a clear equal footing with receiving equitable, fair and rapid sharing of the benefits, including licences to produce pandemic counter-measures like vaccines in developing countries.

“A treaty with mere political rhetoric cannot be an outcome of this process,” Indonesia said on behalf of the group, as two weeks of negotiations closed Thursday without agreement.

“We must be bold, courageous and sincere to have an effective and equitable treaty.”

Mexico said it was concerned by the “limited progress”, while the Philippines said the talks had to acknowledge they were not succeeding.

“We cannot keep on repeating priorities like lists of demands. Reasonable adjustments must not be seen as capitulation,” its representative said.

Meanwhile, Colombia’s negotiator said any agreement “must avoid a complete and general collapse of solidarity”.

“We will not give up because it would be giving up on all those people who have suffered.”

K. M. Gopakumar, senior researcher with the Third World Network NGO, told AFP that the talks’ process started with equity promised at the heart of everything.

“When they reached the real issues, politics overtook the noble ambitions. So now it’s much more economic strategic interests driving the negotiations above public health concerns,” he said.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

The world is on the brink of a public health triumph as it closes in on eradicating Guinea worm disease. There were more than 3.5 million cases of this disease in the 1980s, but according to the World Health Organization’s (WHO) weekly epidemiological report, they dwindled to 14 cases in 2021, 13 in 2022, and just six in 2023.

At a time when medical advancements often headline with breakthrough vaccines and cures, the battle against Guinea worm disease stands out for its reliance on basic public health principles rather than high-tech interventions. Unlike many of its viral counterparts, this parasitic adversary has offered no chance for immunity, defied prevention by vaccines, and resisted most cures – yet the possibility of its eradication is closer than ever thanks to the triumph of human resilience and ingenuity.

Rewind to the 1960s, a period marked by two monumental achievements: humankind’s first steps on the moon and the eradication of smallpox. Fast forward to the present, and space exploration has bounded into new frontiers while smallpox remains the lone entry on the list of diseases (of humans) we have managed to banish entirely. This contrast underscores not a failure of medical science but the complex nature of disease eradication.

Infection cycle

Guinea worm disease, also called dracunculiasis, is the work of the Guinea worm (Dracunculus medinensis), whose infamy dates back to biblical times, when it was called the “fiery serpent” and whose presence researchers have confirmed in Egyptian mummies. Individuals whose bodies the worm has entered first experience a painful blister, usually on a lower limb. When seeking relief, they may immerse the affected area in water, which prompts the worm to emerge and release hundreds of thousands of larvae, potentially contaminating communal water sources and perpetuating the infection cycle.

While a Guinea worm by itself  is not lethal, it debilitates those whom it infects and prevents them from performing daily tasks and earning their livelihoods.

It manifests as a painful skin lesion as the adult worm — sometimes up to a meter long — emerges. This process, which can last weeks, often begins with a blister and develops into an ulcer from which the worm slowly exits the body. The symptoms typically involve intense pain, swelling, and sometimes secondary bacterial infections at the open wound. Sufferers may experience fever, nausea, and vomiting. The pain can incapacitate individuals, hindering daily activities and work.

Legs most susceptible

More than 90% of Guinea worm infections manifest in the legs and feet. The individual has an excruciating experience when the adult female worm emerges through the skin. The open sore left by its exit is also susceptible to secondary infections. The disease affects people of both sexes. The struggle against Guinea worm disease is symbolic of a broader fight against the diseases of poverty and the self-fulfilling relationship between poverty and illness. The disease thrives in areas where access to clean, safe drinking water is a luxury, and health education and resources are scant.

India eliminated Guinea worm disease in the late 1990s, concluding a commendable chapter in the country’s public health history through a rigorous campaign of surveillance, water safety interventions, and community education. The government of India received Guinea worm disease-free certification status from the WHO in 2000.

This accomplishment was the result of a collaboration between the Indian government, local health workers, and international partners. The strategy hinged on empowering local communities with the knowledge and tools to prevent the disease — including filtering water before use and reporting cases to health authorities for immediate response.

The strategy that brought us to the brink of eradication was straightforward: intersectoral coordination, community participation, and a sustained focus on prevention through health education. Unlike many diseases that have been cornered by medical interventions, Guinea worm disease was and is being pushed to extinction using the fundamentals of public health: ensuring access to clean water (by applying a larvicide called Temephos), spreading awareness through community workers, and meticulously tracking cases and containing outbreaks.

The WHO recorded only six cases of Guinea worm disease in 2023. Nations like South Sudan and Mali, where the disease was once more common, have made commendable progress, although the fight continues particularly in Chad and the Central African Republic, where the last vestiges of this disease cling on.

Eradication

In 2020, researchers also discovered Guinea worms in animal reservoirs, particularly dogs, in Chad, casting a shadow of complexity over the final stages of eradication. This development is a crucial reminder of the disease’s tenacity and, importantly, signals to countries where the disease was previously endemic, including India, to not let their guard down. If the worm persists in this way, governments must stay vigilant and maintain adaptable public health strategies to ensure they don’t lose the upper hand.

This said, the significant progress made towards eradicating Guinea worm disease is also threatened by human and political factors, notably civil unrest and poverty. These challenges are not merely logistical but deeply entrenched in the socio-political fabric of the affected areas, where poverty exacerbates vulnerability to disease and conflict disrupts the basic infrastructure required to sustain public health campaigns. In fact, were such conflicts not in the picture, the global community may have crossed the finish line in the fight against Guinea worm disease a decade sooner. The interplay between health and peace is starkly evident in this context, where the absence of stability and security directly affects the fruits of eradication efforts.

Finally eradicating Guinea worm disease wouldn’t just represent a victory over a single parasitic adversary but a triumph of humankind at large. It will underscore a collective moral responsibility towards the most vulnerable among us, and demonstrate the profound impact addressing health disparities can have on communities. Getting rid of this disease will also be a much-needed testament to what we can achieve when global efforts converge to uplift communities from preventable afflictions.

(Dr. C. Aravinda is an academic and public health physician. aravindaaiimsjr10@hotmail.com)

Saima Wazed and Dr. Shambhu Acharya seen together at a meet in New Delhi.
| Photo Credit: Special arrangement

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s daughter, Saima Wazed, was on Wednesday nominated as the next Regional Director for the World Health Organization’s South-East Asia region.

She defeated Shambu Acharya, a public health veteran from Nepal, in a vote held here during the 76th session of the WHO Regional Committee for South-East Asia Region. 

Bangladesh, Bhutan, DPR (North) Korea, India, Indonesia, Maldives, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Timor-Leste — 10 of the 11 member countries — took part in the vote. Myanmar did not send a delegation to the meeting. 

The nomination will be submitted to the WHO Executive Board during its 154th session, which is scheduled to take place on January 22-27 in Geneva, Switzerland, the WHO regional office said in an official communication.

The newly appointed Regional Director will take over from the present incumbent, Poonam Khetrapal Singh, on February 1.

Ms. Wazed, in a statement, said the WHO South-East Asia Region was home to over two billion people — more than a quarter of the people of the planet — and that the region represented a diversity with often differences existing within the boundaries of single member states themselves. She said that her priority areas of work would include universal health coverage (UHC), emergency response and pandemic preparedness, collaboration and partnerships (regional and multi-sectoral), and mental health.

“We will work to promote community-based mental healthcare services in member countries, encourage prevention and promotion in mental health while expanding efforts to include mental health in the public health agenda,” Ms. Wazed said.

Reacting to the result, Swarup Sarkar, former Director of WHO SEARO, said the election demonstrated the collective resolve of member states to move forward with the vision set out by Ms. Wazed.

“As a former WHO staff, I would look forward to a stronger, responsive, and responsible WHO working at the global, regional and country levels, on the principle of one WHO and more participation of civil society at all stages of WHO work,” he said.

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s daughter Saima Wazed. File
| Photo Credit: Twitter/drSaimaWazed

The contest between Bangladesh and Nepal for the regional head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has become increasingly heated, with allegations of “nepotism” and “sexism” being hurled at the candidates, and the election to be held in Delhi less than two weeks away. 

In an interview to The Hindu, Bangladesh’s Foreign Minister has demanded that Nepal, whose candidate Shambhu Acharya is a WHO veteran, withdraw its candidate for the post, in favour of Bangladesh’s candidate Saima Wazed, who is Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s daughter, defending her against the charges of “nepotism”. Ms. Wazed has also alleged that the opposition to her candidature denotes a “vicious strain of sexism” against women competing for “positions of power”. 

“[Nepal’s candidate] had been working in the WHO for the last 30 years and was in a decision-making position. So why have [health indices] not improved in the whole of the South East Asian region, even though he himself is a person of South Asian origin?” Bangladesh Foreign Minister A.K. Abdul Momen asked, adding that the Nepali candidate should “step down” from the election race.

Mr. Acharya refuted the allegations of inefficacy, saying that in fact “the world has made substantial progress in health”. “The responsibility in achieving health for all is a shared responsibility as mentioned in the UNGA (United Nations General Assembly) SDG (Sustainable Development Goals) review,” he added.

When asked about the Bangladesh government’s call to withdraw, Nepal’s Health Minister said that Mr. Acharya is the “most eligible” candidate, pitting his experience in public health against Ms. Wazed’s, who is a psychologist, an activist on autism, and a government advisor.

“Dr. Shambhu Acharya has obtained advanced public health degree and possesses profound experience in public health working in different agencies and at different levels…The Regional Director position requires skills in human resource management, institutional management etc. among others which Dr. Acharya has been doing for more than two decades,” Nepal’s Health Minister Mohan Bahadur Basnet said in a written response.

As The Hindu had reported last month, both countries had forwarded their candidatures for Director of the WHO’s South East Asian Regional Office (SEARO) earlier this year. The post will go to the candidate receiving the majority of votes after a secret ballot by 11 regional members — Bangladesh, Bhutan, North Korea, India, Indonesia, the Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Timor-Leste.  After it became clear that there would be a contest during the upcoming SEARO meeting in Delhi from October 30-November2, an unusually high-profile campaign has followed with Ms. Wazed accompanying Ms. Hasina to a number of international conferences, including the BRICS summit in South Africa, the G-20 summit in Delhi, and the UNGA summit in New York, posting photographs with many world leaders, including U.S. President Joe Biden, Chinese President Xi Jinping, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

After a number of articles in public health journals, including The Lancet and Health Policy Watch, criticised her for using Ms. Hasina’s clout in the campaign, Ms. Wazed hit back in a piece entitled ‘Setting the Record Straight’ last week, where she accused the articles against her of reflecting “damaging biases, that perpetuate harmful stigmas and stereotypes”, adding details of her own experience in advocating for awareness on autism and mental health.

The Ministry of External Affairs declined to comment on India’s choice in the subcontinental tussle. However, officials have said that the Bangladesh candidate has “the edge” given close ties, and Mr. Modi’s promise of support during his visit to Dhaka in 2021 that was mentioned in the India-Bangladesh joint statement at the time. However, the joint statement issued subsequently, during Ms. Hasina’s visit to Delhi in 2022, does not mention the WHO contest. India’s Poonam Khetrapal has been the WHO SEARO Director since 2014, and will hand over the post to the nominated candidate chosen at the Delhi meeting this month, following a ratification of the nomination in January 2024.

Rescuers and relatives sit in front of the collapsed buildings after the recent flooding caused by Mediterranean storm Daniel, in Derna, Libya.
| Photo Credit: AP

Abdel-Hamid al-Hassadi survived the devastating flooding in eastern Libya, but he lost some 90 people from his extended family.

The 23-year-old law graduate rushed upstairs along with his mother and his elder brother, as heavy rains lashed the city of Derna on the evening of September 10. Soon, torrents of water were washing away buildings next to them.

“We witnessed the magnitude of the catastrophe,” Mr. al-Hassadi said in a phone interview, referring to the massive flooding that engulfed his city. “We have seen our neighbours’ dead bodies washing away in the floods.”

Heavy rains from Mediterranean storm Daniel caused the collapse of the two dams that spanned the narrow valley that divides the city. That sent a wall of water several metres high through its heart.

Ten days after the disaster, Mr. Hassadi and thousands of others remain in Derna, most of them waiting for a word about relatives and loved ones. For Mr. Hassadi, 290 relatives are still missing.

“The floods inundated as much as a quarter of the city,” officials say. Thousands of people were killed, with many dead bodies still under the rubble or at sea, according to search teams. Government officials and aid agencies have given varied death tolls.

The World Health Organization says a total of 3,958 deaths have been registered in hospitals, but a previous death toll given by the head of Libya’s Red Crescent said at least 11,300 were killed. The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says at least 9,000 people are still missing.

Bashir Omar, a spokesman for the International Committee of the Red Cross, said the fatalities are in the thousands, but he didn’t give a specific toll for the number of retrieved bodies, since there are many groups involved in the recovery effort.

Many Derna residents, including women and children, are spending all their time at collection points of bodies. They are desperate to know who is inside body bags carried by ambulances. Inside a school in the western part of the city, authorities posted photos of the retrieved bodies.

Anas Aweis, a 24-year-old resident, lost two brothers and is still searching for his father and four cousins. He went to the Ummul Qura school in the Sheiha neighbourhood to inspect the exhibited photos.

“It’s chaos,” he said after spending two hours waiting in lines. “We want to know where they buried them if they died.”

The floods have displaced at least 40,000 people in eastern Libya, including 30,000 in Derna, according to the U.N.’s migration agency. Many have moved to other cities across Libya, hosted by local communities or sheltered in schools. There are risks to staying, including potential infection by waterborne diseases.

Rana Ksaifi, assistant chief of mission in Libya for the U.N.’s refugee agency, said the floods have left “unfathomable levels of destruction,” and triggered new waves of displacement in the already conflict-stricken nation.

The houseplants on the rooftop of Abdul Salam Anwisi’s building survived the waters that reached up to his 4th-floor apartment. Anwisi’s and a few other families rode out the deluge on the roof, which overlooks the Mediterranean Sea. They thought they wouldn’t live to see daylight. Now, as he sifts through the water-damaged debris of his home, it’s unclear what comes next. “God predetermined and he did what he wanted,” he said.

Others across the country are calling for Libya’s leaders to be taken to task. Hundreds of angry protesters gathered on Monday outside Derna’s main mosque, criticising the government’s lack of preparation and response. They lashed out at the political class that controls the oil-rich nation since the ouster and killing of longtime dictator Moammar Gadhafi in 2011.

Mr. Hassadi, the law graduate, blamed local authorities for giving conflicting warnings to residents, leaving many defenceless. They asked residents to evacuate areas along the Mediterranean coast, but at the same time, they imposed a curfew, preventing people from leaving their homes. “It was a mistake to impose a curfew,” he said.

The dams, Abu Mansour and Derna, were built by a Yugoslav construction company in the 1970s. They were meant to protect the city against heavy flooding, but years of no maintenance meant they were unable to keep the exceptional influx of water at bay.

Many Libyans are now calling for an international investigation and supervision of aid funds. “All are corrupt here … without exception,” said rights activist Tarik Lamloum.

The Global Fund announced on August 30 a deal with generic pharmaceutical manufacturers to significantly slash the price of a cutting-edge HIV drug, in a move it said would save lives.

The Global Fund, a partnership set up in 2002 to battle AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria, said the agreement would make it possible to provide the advanced pill known as TLD for under $45 per person per year.

“This improved pricing— a 25% reduction— will allow governments in resource-limited settings to expand access to critical HIV services,” it said in a statement.

The three-in-one pill bands together the drugs tenofovir disoproxil fumarate, lamivudine and dolutegravir.

The World Health Organization has recommended it as the preferred first-line HIV treatment for adults and adolescents since it rapidly suppresses the virus that causes AIDS, has fewer side effects and is easy to take, the statement pointed out.

“The countries most affected by HIV face enormous fiscal constraints, and there are still millions of people who are HIV-positive who don’t have access to quality treatment,” Global Fund chief Peter Sands said in the statement.

“Reduced pricing for TLD means governments and other implementers of Global Fund grants can expand treatment programmes and invest more in prevention, saving more lives and reducing new infections.”

August 30th’s announcement comes after the Global Fund, along with UNAIDS, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and other partners in 2017 secured licensing agreements ensuring that TLD could be made available in low and middle-income countries for up to $75 per person per year at the time an unprecedented pricing level.

Thanks to that deal, around 19 million more people living with HIV in resource-constrained settings are today receiving TLD, according to the Clinton Health Access Initiative.

Vehicles move on a dusty road as air pollution worsens during winters in Tongi area of Gazipur, Bangladesh. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Rising air pollution can cut life expectancy by more than five years per person in South Asia, one of the world’s most polluted regions, according to a report published on August 29 which flagged the growing burden of hazardous air on health.

The region, which includes the world’s most polluted countries of Bangladesh, India, Nepal, and Pakistan, accounts for more than half of the total life years lost globally to pollution, the University of Chicago’s Energy Policy Institute (EPIC) said in its latest Air Quality Life Index.

Rapid industrialisation and population growth have contributed to declining air quality in South Asia, where particulate pollution levels are currently more than 50% higher than at the start of the century and now overshadow dangers posed by larger health threats.

People in Bangladesh, the world’s most polluted country, stands to lose 6.8 years of life on average per person, compared to 3.6 months in the United States, according to the study, which uses satellite data to calculate the impact of an increase in airborne fine particles on life expectancy.

India is responsible for about 59% of the world’s increase in pollution since 2013, the report said, as hazardous air threatens to shorten lives further in some of the country’s more polluted regions. In the densely populated New Delhi, the world’s most polluted mega-city, the average life span is down by more than 10 years.

“Reducing global levels of lung-damaging airborne particles, known as PM 2.5, to levels recommended by the World Health Organization (WHO) could raise average life expectancy by 2.3 years, or a combined 17.8 billion life years,” the report said.

“An average resident of Pakistan would gain 3.9 years from meeting the WHO guidelines of limiting average annual PM 2.5 concentration to 5 micrograms per cubic metre, while someone in Nepal would live 4.6 years longer if the guideline was met,” according to the report.

China, meanwhile, has worked to reduce pollution by 42.3% between 2013 and 2021, the report said, highlighting the need for governments to generate accessible air quality data to help bridge global inequalities in accessing tools to combat pollution.