
Air pollution linked to “huge” reduction in intelligence - crunchiebones
https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/story/air-pollution-linked-huge-reduction-intelligence
======
KenanSulayman
The actual study [1] isn't as much clickbait:

> We find that long-term exposure to air pollution impedes cognitive
> performance in verbal and math tests.

> We provide evidence that the effect of air pollution on verbal tests becomes
> more pronounced as people age, especially for men and the less educated.

> The damage on the aging brain by air pollution likely imposes substantial
> health and economic costs, considering that cognitive functioning is
> critical for the elderly for both running daily errands and making high-
> stake decisions.

[1]
[http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/21/1809474115](http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/21/1809474115)

------
asaph
In case anyone else wanted to quantify "huge":

> “Polluted air can cause everyone to reduce their level of education by one
> year, which is huge,” Yale School of Public Health's Professor Xi Chen, one
> of the report's authors, said in an interview published in The Guardian.[0]

[0] [https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/story/air-
pol...](https://www.unenvironment.org/news-and-stories/story/air-pollution-
linked-huge-reduction-intelligence)

~~~
Bartweiss
I'm glad Chen attempted to give an intelligible quantity, but I'm not really
sure what to make of the metric. "Years of education" don't seem like an
intuitive metric for cognitive impairment. Checking the abstract gets us:

> _Cutting annual mean concentration of particulate matter smaller than 10 μm
> (PM10) in China to the Environmental Protection Agency’s standard (50 μg
> /m3) would move people from the median to the 63rd percentile (verbal test
> scores) and the 58th percentile (math test scores), respectively._

For reference, another study in China found that top-decile levels of lead
poisoning (>10 micrograms per deciliter) cost children about two points of IQ
on both math and verbal scales. That's not trivially convertible to percentile
performance, and I don't know whether air pollution has long-tail effects
anything like the horrible long-tail on lead poisoning.

But it does suggest that particulate pollution has effects on the same general
scale as childhood lead poisoning, which is pretty striking.

Underlying study is here:
[http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/21/1809474115](http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/21/1809474115)

Lead study is here:
[https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3667072/](https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3667072/)

~~~
r00fus
I'd say that a "year of education" is a lot more quantifiable to your average
person than "2 points of IQ".

IQ isn't used for anything meaningful in terms of ability or qualifications,
especially since it's age-adjusted and historically has been biased against
minorities/foreigners. A year of development however, is a graspable (if
shocking) measure of lost opportunity/capability.

~~~
pavelrub
I disagree. "A year of education" is mostly about gaining knowledge. It's
obvious that air pullution can't possibly make you forget one year of such
knowledge, and I have no idea in what other intuitive way this can be
interpreted that makes any sense to the average person. If it's meaningfull to
someone then it's only because he understood it wrongly.

~~~
yorwba
> It's obvious that air pullution can't possibly make you forget one year of
> such knowledge,

Is it? What people remember of one year of education is probably very little
to begin with and it only gets less over time; it doesn't seem unbelievable
that pollution could cause those memories to decay faster.

~~~
pavelrub
Well if that seems plausible to you then it's only further proof of how
misleading the wording is, as the actual study makes no claims about people
forgetting a year of education.

------
Reason077
Electrification of surface transport is the most obvious way to improve air
quality in dense cities. This needs to be a priority.

~~~
tarboreus
If by "electrification" you mean "switch to public transportation," I agree
with you. If by electrification you mean "burn dinosaurs four miles away,"
then I don't agree with you.

~~~
tfha
Burning dinosaurs 40 miles away will improve air quality in cities, even if
it's the same amount of pollution, the bulk is away from dense population

~~~
sgc
It's also much, much easier to filter the output from one plant instead of
40,000 cars. Even if the same amount of pollution were produced (it wouldn't
be), nowhere near the same amount would be released into the air.

But we definitely need to improve power plant emission standards as we move to
electric.

------
titzer
The actual study is linked early in the article here:
([http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/21/1809474115](http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2018/08/21/1809474115))

Quoting:

> ... Cutting annual mean concentration of particulate matter smaller than 10
> μm (PM10) in China to the Environmental Protection Agency’s standard (50
> μg/m3) would move people from the median to the 63rd percentile (verbal test
> scores) and the 58th percentile (math test scores), respectively. The damage
> on the aging brain by air pollution likely imposes substantial health and
> economic costs, considering that cognitive functioning is critical for the
> elderly for both running daily errands and making high-stake decisions.

------
tzs
Meanwhile, the EPA is kicking academic scientists off advisory panels in this
area, and replacing the panels with a small group consisting entirely of
industry scientists and government officials from conservative state and local
governments.

[https://www.washingtonpost.com/energy-
environment/2018/10/14...](https://www.washingtonpost.com/energy-
environment/2018/10/14/epa-scraps-pair-air-pollution-science-
panels/?utm_term=.143dd8b161c8)

------
peacetreefrog
I'd be interested in how reading more about how they're controlling for non-
air pollution factors, particularly since they say the effects are most
pronounced among the non educated.

~~~
peacetreefrog
For example: assume in China that people in cities generally have more
opportunities to get educated.

That'd mean if you live in a city and have not had much education, it might be
because you are less intelligent (on average). While if you're in a rural
area, a lack of education might not mean anything, because you have less
opportunity to get educated in general, regardless of intelligence.

If you did a simple regression in this case with years of education and air
pollution (more common in cities) in the model, I think you'd find that --
controlling for education -- air pollution would be correlated with a
reduction of intelligence, even if the air pollution itself wasn't causal.

There are ways of controlling for this, and I'm not at all saying the study
didn't take this into account, but it'd be useful to know more. There are a
lot of ways (as in any model) the relationship could be correlated without
being causal.

------
dest
I think it is misleading to display a picture of chimneys of nuclear power
plants, when the only thing they release is clean water droplets: no SO2, NO2
or PM10.

edit: Actually, not 100% sure it's a nuclear power plant. Thanks for your
comments

~~~
MichaelApproved
Do you know for sure that it's a nuclear plant in the picture? I'm asking
because those iconic cooling towers are also used for coal plants.

> The hyperboloid cooling towers are often associated with nuclear power
> plants,[1] although they are also used in some coal-fired plants and to some
> extent in some large chemical and other industrial plants.

\-
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooling_tower](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooling_tower)

Direct link to the picture from the article
[https://www.unenvironment.org/sites/default/files/styles/art...](https://www.unenvironment.org/sites/default/files/styles/article_billboard_image/public/2018-10/2010-10-Air%20pollution-
CHINA-USA-CLIMATE.jpg)

Example cooling towers from a coal-fired power plant
[https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-eon-scholven-power-
station...](https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-eon-scholven-power-station-coal-
fired-power-plant-cooling-towers-gelsenkirchen-89211541.html)

~~~
khuey
Even if it's not a nuclear power plant it's still a cooling tower releasing
only water vapor.

~~~
StavrosK
Some new designs release both water vapor and other gases in the same tower,
but yeah, those look like cooling towers releasing just vapor.

------
dcx
I don't think this has been mentioned on this thread yet: If you live in a
place where air pollution is a concern, one solution to this issue is to buy a
HEPA air filter. These filters are designed to trap a significant quantity of
precisely the types of particles that air quality studies examine (2.5-10µm
coarse dust particles and <2.5µm fine particles).

> "To qualify as HEPA by industry standards, an air filter must remove (from
> the air that passes through) 99.97% of particles that have a size greater-
> than-or-equal-to 0.3 µm." [1]

[1] [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HEPA](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HEPA)

~~~
amluto
That’s only helpful while you’re at home.

Also, the obsession with HEPA and its 99.7% reduction of the relevant
particles seems silly to me. For a filter that recirculates air, the relevant
figure of merit is the rate at which dirty air is replaced with clean air,
which is roughly the air flow through the filter times the efficiency. So a
90% efficient filter with 50% more airflow is better. For a stand-alone unit,
the “clean air delivery rate” is a more sophisticated measurement.

You can do _very_ well by upgrading your HVAC filter to MERV 13 or better and
running the fan for a few hours a day. But check with an HVAC contractor
before you change filter types — it may affect the overall performance of the
system.

For an outside air intake, the efficiency does matter, and HEPA is a good
idea.

------
chadlavi
I think that correlation works in both directions!

------
meesterdude
I know a certain framework creator that will be all over this - and has been
vocal on twitter about it.

I went looking, this seems like a pretty good air quality monitor:
[https://www.amazon.com/AirVisual-Quality-Monitor-Accuracy-
Pa...](https://www.amazon.com/AirVisual-Quality-Monitor-Accuracy-
Particle/dp/B01MF6X1YK) (~$400)

There are cheaper ones too; but do your research, as accuracy (and ideas about
what constitutes accurate) can vary from manuf. to manuf.

[https://medium.com/@dhh/air-quality-matters-but-dont-
trust-f...](https://medium.com/@dhh/air-quality-matters-but-dont-trust-foobot-
on-it-e2df4234a776)

also apparently, a box fan + filter ain't so bad.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kH5APw_SLUU](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kH5APw_SLUU)

------
eneveu
I recently learned that the parisian subway and suburban trains contain a lot
of particulate pollution (e.g. PM10), caused by braking (electrical brakes
would reduce this) and rail grinding (maintenance done to reduce squealing in
curves). The small particulate pollution is actually worse than what you find
in traffic jams in the city center...

I'm looking into buying an anti-pollution mask. It will probably look weird,
since nobody wears masks there... People will probably think I'm sick or
something. Maybe I should buy some techwear clothing to complete the "goth-
ninja" look, but I'm not sure how that will fly at work.

I have an air purifier at home since 3 years (Philips AC4072/11). I think it's
a good investment, since I spend around 50% of the time at home. It also seems
to have helped with my allergies, but that might be placebo.

~~~
apta
For what it's worth, I wear a respirator[1] when I take the subway. Some
people may look at you, but I don't really care.

That being said, I recall reading an article where they said studied long term
subway commuters and did not find health issues due to commuting.

Furthermore, you can apparently build an air filter for the fraction of the
cost:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q45CkwKiOvw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q45CkwKiOvw)

[1] like the "3M Aura Particulate Respirator". There are also filter with
activated charcoal

~~~
imcoconut
Do you live in NYC? and have you found that it helps?

~~~
apta
I commute to NYC. Yes it reduces the subway smell substantially.

------
yorwba
Previous discussion of the same topic:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17867085](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17867085)

------
elektor
If you're curious about your own exposure to air pollutants, I'd recommend
Plume Labs. They also have a handheld device that I preordered and hope to
take around my town to see where the hotspots are.
[https://air.plumelabs.com/en/](https://air.plumelabs.com/en/)

------
robynsmith
Is there a way to counteract the effects? Especially if you live in a large
city?

~~~
QasimK
I’m going to hazard a guess and say exercise - yes, even outside in the
pollution (though you should probably favour a park over a main road).

------
jeffdavis
What's with the use of the word "linked"? Is thay synonymous with
"correlated"?

I feel like it's just another way to suggest causation without knowing that it
is causation.

~~~
wccrawford
It's more of a weasel word than correlated is, even. It suggests that there's
a meaningful connection but it could just be coincidence, even moreso than
correlation.

~~~
singularity2001
correlated is well defined.

but can be used by weasels, so yes.

------
ct520
china number 1

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baybal2
Beijing central district anybody?

------
randyrand
industrial places have less of a demand on higher education

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ramijames
Well that explains Los Angeles.

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randyrand
industrial places have less of a demand for education

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vectorEQ
do something about education and media - that has an actual HUGE impact...

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ryeguy_24
I’ve always beleived that measuring intelligence is extremely ignorant. I find
it funny that we try to take the insanely complex, multi-dimensional organ of
the brain and try to map it to a one dimensional score (e.g. IQ, verbal, math
tests).

------
m23khan
With China and India leading the race in terms of producing intelligent people
(in terms of quantity), it is rather hard to believe. Nonetheless, air
pollution is a serious topic and needs to be dealt with ASAP.

~~~
lostmsu
What? Are you talking about percentages?

------
sneak
Reminder: part of Google’s new Project Dragonfly is a feature that allows
Beijing to lie about air pollution figures in real-time.

[https://theintercept.com/2018/09/14/google-china-
prototype-l...](https://theintercept.com/2018/09/14/google-china-prototype-
links-searches-to-phone-numbers/)

