| Dear
EarthTalk: What are the leading causes of child
mortality around the world, and what can be done about it?
-- Susan Hale, Oquawka, IL
The statistics are staggering. In the world’s poorest
countries, over 30,000 children under the age of five die
each day from preventable causes related to conditions of
extreme poverty. Rock Star Bono and others tried to call attention
to this fact last year in television ads showing well-known
celebrities snapping their fingers every three seconds, each
snap representing another tragic child death.
A baby girl born in Sub-Saharan Africa today faces a 22 percent
risk of death by age 15, and more than a third of casualties
are babies who don't survive their first month. They suffer
from low birth weight due to their mothers’ poor nutrition,
and then lack access to adequate nutrition themselves. The
World Health Organization says that poverty-related malnutrition
is the key factor in over half of all childhood deaths.
Many children suffer from debilitating infections virtually
right out of the womb, and analysts say that often casualties
could be prevented if just basic sanitation were available.
Drinking-water pollution is a leading culprit. In areas that
lack proper sanitation and that may have just one water source,
supplies can easily become contaminated from bacteria in human
waste and garbage. According to United Nations statistics,
as many as four billion people--two-thirds of global population--lack
access to safe, clean water.
Concern from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has spurred
renewed efforts to increase education and distribute low-cost
but needed tools such as antibiotics and sterile medical implements.
“Some global health problems, like AIDS, have no easy
solution--but this isn't one of them,” says computer-geek-turned-philanthropist
Bill Gates. “The world has an opportunity to stop millions
of newborn deaths each year.”
Debt and population issues are also among the underlying causes
of this global tragedy. Some poor nations must pay more in
service of international loans than on the health and education
of their people. Yielding to pressure from “Make Poverty
History” advocates, leaders of the world’s top
industrialized nations last year agreed to cancel $40 billion
in debt owed by the world’s 18 poorest countries. However,
experts point out that this only covers about a sixth of the
debt owed, for example, by African nations.
And birth rates continue to soar well above the replacement
level of two children per couple, and population is growing
well beyond the “carrying capacity” of these poor
countries. This has a profound effect on the environment as
well as on human misery. According to Population Action International
(PAI), “More than 200 million women in the developing
world today wish to delay or end childbearing but do not have
access to modern and effective contraceptives.” In spite
of this, the Bush Administration has steadily cut family planning
aid to developing countries in the name of preventing abortions,
though on June 9 of this year the House overwhelmingly adopted
a bill to restore aid that had been previously cut. Says PAI,
“U.S. leadership and investments in international family
planning assistance are critical in order to ensure healthy
mothers, healthy pregnancies, and ultimately, healthy families.”
CONTACTS: Make Poverty History Campaign,
www.makepovertyhistory.org;
Gates Foundation Child Health Program, www.glf.org/GlobalHealth/Pri_Diseases/ChildHealth/default.htm;
Population Action International, www.populationaction.org.
PHOTO
COURTESY OF GETTY IMAGES
Air
pollution "cooking" in the heat and hot sun during
heat waves can knock asthma sufferers for a loop.
Dear EarthTalk:
Why does air quality get so bad during heat waves?
-- Chad Muller, Wellesley, Mass.
Air quality decreases during times of hot temperatures because
the heat and sunlight essentially cook the air along with
all the chemical compounds lingering within it. This chemical
soup combines with the naturally occurring nitrogen oxide
in the air, creating a “smog” of ground-level
ozone gas. This makes breathing difficult for those who already
have respiratory ailments or heart problems and can also make
healthy people more susceptible to respiratory infections.
According to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),
urban areas are the most susceptible because of all the pollution
being emitted from cars, trucks and buses. The burning of
fossil fuels at power plants also emits a considerable amount
of smog-making pollution. Geography is also a factor. Broad
industrialized valleys penned in by mountain ranges, such
as the Los Angeles basin, tend to trap smog, making life miserable
for those people working or playing outside on hot summer
days.
The non-profit watchdog group Clean Air Watch reported that
July’s intense heat wave caused a blanket of smog stretching
from coast to coast. Some 38 U.S. states reported more unhealthy
air days in July 2006 than during the same month the previous
year. And in some particularly at-risk locales, airborne smog
levels exceeded the acceptable healthy standard by as much
as 1,000-fold.
In light of recent heat waves, the EPA urges urban dwellers
and suburbanites to help reduce smog by: using public transit
and carpooling to reduce vehicle trips; refueling cars at
night to prevent escaping gas vapors from getting cooked into
smog by sunlight; avoiding gas-powered lawn equipment; and
setting air conditioning thermostats a few degrees higher
to help reduce the fossil fuel burning needed to power them.
For its part, the EPA is quick to point out that the regulations
on power plants and car fuels that have been instituted over
the last 25 years have significantly reduced smog in American
cities. EPA spokesman John Millett says that “ozone
pollution concentrations have declined about 20 percent since
1980.” Millett adds that the agency is in the process
of implementing new programs to control emissions from diesel
trucks and farming equipment, and is requiring cleaner diesel
fuel to help further reduce smog levels. New rules to regulate
marine vessels and locomotives should also help minimize future
smog alerts.
“Long-term we have made improvements … but this
heat wave and the accompanying smog is a very graphic reminder
that we still have a significant problem,” says Frank
O'Donnell, Clean Air Watch’s president. “Unless
we start getting serious about global warming, predicted increases
in global temperatures could mean continued smog problems
in the future. And that will mean more asthma attacks, disease
and death.”
People should avoid strenuous outdoor activity during heat
waves in areas plagued by smog. For more information, check
out the government’s “Ozone and Your Health”
report on the website airnow.gov.
CONTACTS: Clean Air Watch,
www.cleanairwatch.org; AirNow’s Ozone and Your Health
Report, airnow.gov/index.cfm?actionfiltered=static.brochure
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