Air pollution causes 6.7m deaths a year: UNEP

KABUL (Pajhwok): The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) says 99 percent of the world’s population breathing unsafe air and causing more than 6.7 million premature deaths a year.

The UNEP wrote in its X page: “Airborne contaminants are the biggest direct environmental health risks of our time, with 99 per cent of the world’s population breathing unsafe air.”

The exposure of air pollution significantly increases the risk of strokes, heart, and lung disease, cancer and other ailments, causing more than 6.7 million premature deaths a year.

On the fourth annual Clean Air Day, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) sat down with Martina Otto, the head of the secretariat of the UNEP-convened Climate and Clean Air Coalition, to find out how the world can counter the fallout from air pollution.