China ‘not being truthful’ in its pollution reports
Industries have been linked to high pollution levels.
What you need to know:
- Air pollution increases the risk of respiratory infections among other diseases
China’s air pollution might be under-reported, a new study suggests.
Data on air pollution in the country is statistically different in different monitoring stations, according to a study published in the journal PLOS One.
Research at Harvard and Boston universities compared measurements by Chinese monitoring stations and US embassy-controlled monitoring stations in five large Chinese cities for three years.
The measurements of particulate matter (PM2.5) pollution used to be conducted hourly.
From the comparison, the researchers observed that there was a statistical difference in data from the different stations. The differences were big and could not be ignored.
They also observed that when air pollution was high, the local stations systematically reported lower PM2.5 levels than those reported by US stations.
According to the research report, hourly differences were also more likely when the air quality was mainly poor.
Air pollution increases the risk of respiratory infections among other diseases.
