Air pollution  

pollution consist of chemicals or particles in the air that can harm the health of humans, animals, and plants. It also damages buildings. These pollutants in air are always in the form of either gases, solid particles, or liquid droplets. Air pollution has been seen as a vey local national problem. Over the last several decades, scientists have continued to build an extensive body of evidence on the risks that breathing poor-quality air poses to human health and our environment, perhaps the most extensive evidence that exists for any environmental risk factor. The number of pollutants gases in the atmosphere has moved up from the 5th to the 4th leading risk factor for death globally. Air pollutants are responsible for chronic disease like obesity,  high cholesterol, and malnutrition. In addition, more than 7 million people are killed because of polluted air that we breathe. The most vulnerable persons that are inflicted with these pollutants in the air are low and middle-income countries. The most vulnerable in our societies today are the children and elderly people who tend to develop poor breathing conditions and stunted lungs. It is a painful story as no progress has been made in many parts of the world to reduce air pollution. 

Majority of these pollutants gases comes through human activities like burning of fossil fuels, driving of vehicles with exhausted fumes and emission from agriculture and industry. The effect of air pollution has been very alarming. Both humans, plants and animals suffer from the effects of air pollution. Human health becomes at stake of asthma attack, cancer, heart attacks and strokes when these gases are inhaled. In addition, greenhouse gases trapped in the atmosphere contributes to warmer temperatures, exacerbating climate change. Air pollution also affects the quality of soil and water.  One of the most devastating effect of these pollutant  gases is acid rain. Acid rain destroys crops, statues and pains on walls. When it gets into water bodies, it causes harm to aquatic lives.

Pollutants travels over long distances and for us to solve these issues, global and sustainable practices needs to be put in place help curb air pollution.  Air pollution can be reduced by introduce stronger clean air laws and policies to better protect people’s health and support the shift to cleaner alternatives. Burning solid fuels, such as stoves, wood burning, leaves and rubbish should be replaced with biofuels that emits little and less harmful amount of pollutants gases compared with the normal fuels. Planting of more greenery,  and supporting local green initiative  will be a big move improve long-term air quality.  Plastic bags should be replaced with biodegradable bags. People should adopt the old way system where plant leaves are used to bundle food rather than plastic peppers. Existing waste should either be reused, recycled and reduced.

Our planet is changing, rising carbon emission are accelerating climate change. Our forest are disappearing. The air we breathe and the oceans we depend on are polluted. Vulnerable plants and animals are under threat.  To meet these challenges we can basically change the way we live in the world and on earth. Reducing air pollution is very vital for both the environment and human health. Air pollution is a grave risk that affects everyone, which is why all of us must act now.