1 November 2017

Deutsche Welle: Pollution killing more people than war and violence, says report

One in every six premature deaths worldwide in 2015, could be attributed to diseases caused by toxins in air or water, the study says.

Of the 9 million people killed prematurely by pollution, air pollution was the main cause of deaths, responsible for 6.5 million of the fatalities, followed by water pollution, which killed 1.8 million.

The estimate of 9 million premature deaths, considered conservative by the authors, is one and a half times higher than the number of people killed by smoking, and three times the death toll from AIDS, turberculosis and malaria combined. It is also 15 times the number of people killed in war or other forms of violence. [...]

The report also attributed massive costs to pollution-related death, sickness and welfare, estimating the costs at some $4.6 trillion (€3.89 trillion) in annual losses — or about 6.2 percent of the global economy.

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