More than 35,000 people have lost their lives in the past nine years due to air pollution in the country. In a written reply in Rajya Sabha, Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar said, "35,616 people have died due to Acute Respiratory Infection from 2006-15 and over two crore cases are reported every year across the country due to respiratory ailments generally caused by air pollution."
Environmentalists said a lot more needs to be done to curb pollution. Environmentalist Arumita Roy Chaudhary said, "We have just seen denials. What the government is doing is not enough, hard steps like policy change is needed."
According to Central Pollution Control Board data, West Bengal reported the most number of acute respiratory diseases followed by Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
In May, a World Health Organization report showed that deaths due to air pollution have increased four fold across the globe over the past decade. China and India were named the worst affected countries.
A recent study published in Environmental Science and Technology journal had claimed that foul air was killing up to 80 people a day in Delhi alone.
A doctor from Ganga Ram hospital in Delhi said, "Air pollution Causes severe bronchitis, chest diseses etc."
The Environment Minister also stated steps taken by them to minimise the impact of environmental pollution, like formulation of regulations, monitoring of air quality, introduction of cleaner fuels though many praised this initiative by the government, environmentalists feel a lot more needs to be done on ground to tackle this menace.
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