This is just sad. I live in an Indian metro, in an upper middle class neighborhood, and recently saw a pile of plastic burning on the side of our street. This happens infrequently (handful of times in a year), but only because of the pressure from the residents here who can afford to apply power to push it out of our neighborhood.
The smoke is dense, white and spreads quickly. It has a strong smell to it and quickly seeps into adjacent homes (which are 5 storied apartment buildings, so it reaches a lot of people). It gives me a headache that lasts for at least a couple of hours.
I can't even imagine what it would be like to live in Muzaffarnagar (city from article) next to one of these plastic burning facilities if one small pile on my street had such a big impact on my family's wellbeing.
> Around Muzaffarnagar, respiratory problems such as asthma and bronchitis along with eye infections associated with air pollution and the burning of plastic are on the rise, up as much as 30% over the last few years, according to Muzaffarnagar’s chief medical officer.
Mainstream narrative over-indexes on long-term impact of global warming vs. the shorter term health impacts of pollution. This makes sense: when developed countries dictate global media narrative, they're not going to focus on the pollution aspect much because it doesn't impact them in a tangible, day-to-day basis.
But the immediate health impact is a stronger narrative: there are people who are impacted by it every day and are dying. It has a face to it. We need a lot more coverage on this front. Grateful for this article.
The smoke is dense, white and spreads quickly. It has a strong smell to it and quickly seeps into adjacent homes (which are 5 storied apartment buildings, so it reaches a lot of people). It gives me a headache that lasts for at least a couple of hours.
I can't even imagine what it would be like to live in Muzaffarnagar (city from article) next to one of these plastic burning facilities if one small pile on my street had such a big impact on my family's wellbeing.
> Around Muzaffarnagar, respiratory problems such as asthma and bronchitis along with eye infections associated with air pollution and the burning of plastic are on the rise, up as much as 30% over the last few years, according to Muzaffarnagar’s chief medical officer.
Mainstream narrative over-indexes on long-term impact of global warming vs. the shorter term health impacts of pollution. This makes sense: when developed countries dictate global media narrative, they're not going to focus on the pollution aspect much because it doesn't impact them in a tangible, day-to-day basis.
But the immediate health impact is a stronger narrative: there are people who are impacted by it every day and are dying. It has a face to it. We need a lot more coverage on this front. Grateful for this article.