Environmental pollution is a greater health threat than war, malaria, AIDS, drugs and alcohol combined.

The paper notes that there is an urgent need to improve monitoring of these pollutants to identify communities most at risk and to better understand how exposure to specific pollutants increases the risk of cardiovascular disease at the individual level.

“There needs to be much greater recognition of the dangers of pollution and the role it plays in the deaths of approximately nine million people worldwide each year,” said Jason Kovacic, chief executive of the Victor Chang Institute of Heart Research (Australia).

Kovacic recalls that every year “about 20 million people worldwide die from cardiovascular diseases, and pollutants play an increasingly important role.”

Pollutants have reached every corner of the world and affect us all, he says. “ANDWe are seeing unprecedented forest fires, high temperatures, and unacceptable noise on the roads. light pollution in our cities and exposure to untested toxic chemicals in our homes.”

Kovacic decries that “our bodies are bombarded with pollutants from all sides, and this affects the health of our hearts. “Evidence suggests that the number of people dying prematurely due to these different forms of pollution is much higher than currently believed.”

Pollutants are known to cause cardiovascular disease, but they affect the body in different ways. Smoke and other toxins can be inhaled directly into the lower respiratory tract and into the bloodstream and then transferred to other organs and throughout the body. They can cause oxidative stress, which can damage cells and organs, including the heart.

Other pollutants, such as noise and light pollution, can affect sleep, cause inflammation, and lead to high blood pressure and weight gain. Extreme heat can also cause dehydration, decreased blood volume, increased cardiovascular stress, and acute kidney failure.

“There are hundreds of thousands of chemicals that have not even been analyzed for safety or toxicity, let alone their impact on our health. TWe also need to find out whether there are other risk factors that make people more susceptible.such as pre-existing conditions, lifestyle factors or location.

Professor Kovacic and other authors say that in the future people will be regularly tested for exposure to more pollutants, just as children in the US are currently tested for lead exposure.