: A recent survey has revealed that the quality of indoor air in Gurgaon is poor.
The survey was conducted by Artemis Hospital under the Clean Air India Movement. As many as 628 people across offices and houses in Gurgaon were covered. While the offices belonged to the automobile, information technology and manufacturing sectors, the residential areas included Sushant Lok, Nirvana Country, Sector-4 and DLF Phase-III.
Symptom scoring was done for individuals along with pollution-level check at each location.
Shocking revelation
According to the survey, about 76 per cent of the offices and houses had PM 2.5 levels far above normal.
The survey also highlights the relation between indoor air quality and lung health. Due to unhealthy indoor air quality, about 31 per cent of the respondents had some kind of airway disease and 46 per cent people were found to have symptoms suggesting a respiratory disease.
“People almost spend 90 per cent of their time indoors. Thus, for many people, the risks to health may be greater due to indoor air pollution than outdoors. A pollutant released indoors is 1,000 times more likely to affect human lungs than a pollutant released outdoors,” read a statement issued by Artemis Hospital.
Cause of cancer
More than 1.6 million people, mainly women and children, die prematurely each year after breathing high levels of indoor smoke/air. The International Agency for Research on Cancer and the World Health Organization have concluded that 80 per cent of all cancers are attributed to environmental rather than genetic factors, including exposure to carcinogenic chemicals mostly found in household cleaning products.
“In Gurgaon, the situation becomes bad due to construction work and vehicular pollution,” said Dr. Himanshu Garg, Head of Department, Respiratory and Critical Care, Artemis Hospital.
