In the article “What We Do and Don’t Know about the Links between Air Pollution and Coronavirus” written by Alistair Levis (2020), an atmospheric scientist, explains and supports the strong connection between them and states other factors which could exacerbate the mortality from the virus. He supports his views by stating the similarities of health conditions issues between smog and coronavirus that increase the number of deaths. Alistair also mentions that exchange of views by people on “how air pollution affects the rates of mortality from the disease” was tough to conclude considering the strong connection between both. He also states other contributors that “increase the prevalence of underlying health conditions” of individuals. When these factors pile up, those with the virus may have their health deteriorate further. Additionally, it is questionable that improving air pollution will proportionally ameliorate the spread of the disease. While I agree with Levi's explanation, I feel that he could have elaborated on the other factors such as poverty, individuals underlying medical conditions and population rate exacerbating the virus situation while discussing air pollution impact on it.
Despite the article stating, “They often use mass transit systems, they can have higher rates of poverty and deprivation, and cities contain proportionally larger ethnic minority populations”. It could have explained more on how poverty link with coronavirus, such as BBC animation describing that" The coronavirus pandemic has not affected all communities equally, with wealth appearing to be a key factor”. It has shown statistics by an Economists at the University of Oxford who found that an individual with high salary has lesser physical contact with others compared to lower salary individuals. That is only agreeable in countries that allow work from home policy which also means that they are less likely to be exposed to outside as they would not need to travel. Moreover, the penurious you are the more likely you will be living in compacted space with others, which gives the virus a higher chance to spread and not many can afford healthcare. If the article was not bias on supporting pollution’s links, it could have detailed more on the facts between poverty and virus.
Secondly, the article does mention that individuals underlying medical conditions with covid contributed to the spike in the mortality rate while it failed to support with data on how. I believe the demographic data from (The Washington Post, June 16, 2020) provides a vision of how any age group with illness are liable to virus exposure which would deteriorate their health causing death. This article states how people with lack of access to medical care and left untreated due to racism are missing out from the data. Hence, there is uncertainty in the number of deaths that were caused by not treating illness on time. I feel that Levis should have supported his statement with facts that would help to understand it better.
Lastly, the article could have mentioned about population rate that has proved to be one of the major causes of air pollution. As the population rate increase, the emissions also increase that cause air pollution. The Coronovirus Pandemic (20 April 2020) states that we as humans fail to understand that virus death is caused by us.
Reference:
Payne J. (4 June 2020). Coronavirus and poverty: Is there a link? - https://www.bbc.com/news/av/health-52920591
McCarty S. (20 April 2020). Why Covid-19 is a human overpopulation problem – perhaps humans are the virus? - https://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/short-reads/article/3080360/why-covid-19-human-overpopulation-problem
Carrington D, Environment editor (20 April 2020). Air pollution may be ‘key contributor’ to Covid-19 deaths - https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/apr/20/air-pollution-may-be-key-contributor-to-covid-19-deaths-study
Sun L. (16 July 2020). Patients with underlying conditions were 12 times as likely to die of covid-19 as otherwise healthy people, CDC finds. - https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2020/06/15/patients-with-underlying-conditions-were-12-times-more-likely-die-covid-19-than-otherwise-healthy-people-cdc-finds/
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