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Child Hospital Visits Rise With Pollution In Hong Kong
Hong Kong (AFP) Sep 21, 2006 The number of children admitted to hospital with breathing problems rises considerably as smog levels soar, a Hong Kong study revealed Thursday, heightening concerns as the city's air quality deteriorates. Researchers at Hong Kong University found that rise in pollutants such as sulphur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and ozone of around three percent produced a five percent rise in the number of children admitted to hospital with asthma. "If ambient level of these pollutants were reduced by an average of around 50 percent, it could have cut down around 3,400 hospital admissions for asthma in children during the study period," a study report concluded. "There is a need for health policy makers to develop more stringent air quality objectives and take high risk groups into consideration such as those at the extreme of ages, with chronic respiratory or cardiovascular illnesses," it added. Smog levels in Hong Kong have risen in the past few years to often dangerous levels. Poor air quality reduced visibility to less than one kilometer (about half a mile) on more than 50 days last year. The government says the problem is mostly due to the industrialisation of southern China's neighbouring Pearl River Delta region, while green groups blame local coal-burning power stations and diesel-powered buses. Growing concern over the severe increase has put the issue at the top of the political agenda, and the government has been criticised for ignoring it. Source: Agence France-Presse Community Email This Article Comment On This Article Related Links Hong Kong University Our Polluted World and Cleaning It Up Our Polluted World and Cleaning It Up
Floating Garbage Piling Up In Three Gorges Dam
Beijing (AFP) Sep 21, 2006Massive amounts of floating garbage are accumulating behind China's giant Three Gorges Dam due to a drought and a host of other factors, state press said Thursday. Several months of drought in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River, China's longest, had reduced its capacity to clean itself, Xinhua news agency quoted Cao Guangjing, vice manager of the Three Gorges Corporation, as saying. |
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