The World's Fastest-Growing Cause of Death Is Pollution From Car Exhaust

pigrabbitbear writes "Cars, once again, are killing us. They're killing us in crashes and accidents, yes, and they're encouraging us to grow obese and then killing us a little more slowly. But, more than ever before, they're killing us with their pollution. Particulate air pollution, along with obesity, is now the two fastest-growing causes of death in the world, according to a new study published in the Lancet. The study found that in 2010, 3.2 million people died prematurely from the air pollution – particularly the sooty kind that spews from the exhaust pipes of cars and trucks. And of those untimely deaths, 2.1 million were in Asia, where a boom in car use has choked the streets of India and China's fast-expanding cities with smog."

Comments

I knew Ford Prefect was correct!

[ColdWetDog]

Cars want to be dominant form of intelligent life on the planet!

Just as soon as they get the bugs out of the in-dash entertainment systems, we're toast!

Re:I knew Ford Prefect was correct!

[Jetra]

Damn, and here I thought Cars was just a kids movie. Who'd have thought it was actually a vision of the future?

Re:I knew Ford Prefect was correct!

[mcgrew]

Wait, which book was that? I don't recall Ford saying anything like that.

As to the actual topic at hand, TFS reads... well... not too intelligently, starting with the headline "The World's Fastest-Growing Cause of Death Is Pollution From Car Exhaust". Uh, CAR exhaust? What about the busses, trucks, boats, airplanes, and other internal combustion vehicles? Id wager that eighteen wheeler pollutes more than my car, and I'd bet the farm a B-52 does.

"Cars, once again, are killing us."

Uh, they ever stopped?

"and they're encouraging us to grow obese and then killing us a little more slowly"

Cars have been around for over a hundred years. So why is it only now that people are getting fat? You think it might not be the cars we've been riding in every day of our lives but instead the fact that everything you eat has HFCS in it, and that what was once a large soda at McDonald's is now a small soda? Or that portion sizes in every damned restaraunt I've seen have likewise skyrocketed? Nah, it must be the cars that made you (but not your dad or grandpa who also had cars all their lives) fat.

"But, more than ever before, they're killing us with their pollution"

Bullshit. Cars don't pollute at all when compared to cars 50 years ago that ran on leaded gas and had no catylitic converters or other emissions controls. What comparitively "little" they do pollute is only compounded by the numer of them worldwide.

And guess what? Pollution in Hong Kong doesn't affect my health at all. My environment is VASTLY cleaner than it was 50 years ago when I was ten, before the EPA, back when rivers caught fire and you couldn't drive past Monsanto with the windows down.

"Particulate air pollution, along with obesity, is now the two fastest-growing causes of death in the world, according to a new study published in the Lancet."

That's because when they were third world, they were dying from disentery and TB and their countries had no cars at all.

They're not killing us, they're killing Indians and Chinese and other newly industrialized people. I'd say it's a net win for the world. I'd much rather die of a heart attack at age 50 than die of starvation at age 70.

Why?

[drainbramage]

Is is because of the accent?

Re:And I'm the God Damned Easter Bunny

[Anonymous Coward]

That's not true in every country.

After living in a developing country for a while, my snot turned greyish blue from the exhaust from cars (and probably more from buses and trucks, based on visual evidence). Pollution from vehicles and cars can get really bad.

Re:Industrialization is quickly coming

[Frosty Piss]

1.88M tall, 90 kg, just like every other mutt Dutchman in the world.

Sure you are.

And anyway, if you *ARE* a "Dutchman" than you really have no place to comment about fat Americans.