Report Names the World’s Worst Pollution Problems

     On October 27, 2008, two international environmental groups -- U.S.-based Blacksmith Institute and Green Cross Switzerland -- issued a Top Ten list of the world's worst pollution problems.  The report addresses the role of pollution as a contributing factor to death and disability in the world and highlights the disproportionate effects on children's health.  Rather than focusing on specific locations, this report gives an overview of significant pollution threats humans face throughout the world.

     The Top Ten appear in a report titled, "The World's Worst Pollution Problems: The Top Ten of The Toxic Twenty."  The report is the result of an analysis of more than 600 sites in Blacksmith's database of polluted places as well as from nominations by the report’s listed environmental, science and public health experts.

     The Top Ten includes both commonly discussed pollution problems like urban air pollution and more overlooked threats like car battery recycling.  The problems included in the report are claimed by the report to have a significant impact on human health worldwide and result in death, persistent illness, and neurological impairment for millions.  The report concludes that many of these deaths and related illnesses could be avoided with affordable and effective interventions.

     The Top Ten list, unranked within the report, was listed as follows:

• Indoor air pollution

• Urban air quality

• Untreated sewage

• Groundwater contamination

• Contaminated surface water

• Artisanal gold mining

• Industrial mining activities

• Metals smelting and other processing

• Radioactive waste and uranium mining

• Used lead-acid battery recycling

     A little known though serious environmental health problem arises from the occupation of Artisanal mining, which refers to mining activities that use rudimentary methods to extract and process minerals and metals on a small scale.  Artisanal miners also frequently use toxic materials in their attempts to recover metals and gems.  There are an estimated 10-15 million Artisanal Miners worldwide who mine for gold.  These miners use mercury to form an amalgam with the gold contained in mined soil.  That amalgam is later burned; evaporating the mercury while leaving behind gold.  The evaporated mercury is extremely toxic if inhaled and then quickly condenses and finds its way into local water supplies, where it may either be ingested directly by humans, or bio-accumulate in fish, which in turn are eaten by humans.  An estimated one third of global mercury emissions come from these activities, yet the problem is largely unknown.

     The report also includes a second list of ten additional environmental problems that are claimed in the report to be serious in scope and effect, though not to the extent of the Top Ten list.  The second ten list is as follows:

•Abandoned Mines

•Agrotoxins and Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs)

•Arsenic

•Cadmium

•Chromium

•Coal Power Plants

•Garbage Dumps

•Industrial Estates

•PCBs

•Old and Abandoned Chemical Weapons

•Oil Refineries and Petrochemical Plants

     While some of the facts and findings of this report may be questioned or challenged by compelling facts or contradictory data, it is apparent that the report identifies some extremely serious environmental health problems around the world.

     To obtain a download copy of the report The World’s Worst Pollution Problems, see the following web site:  http://www.worstpolluted.org/

     This article was excerpted from the report The World’s Worst Pollution Problems and other publically available information, and was authored by Rick Wilson, Acacia Environmental Group LLC.

     This article was authored by Rick Wilson, Acacia Environmental Group LLC. For more information on the author see here.