ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH ON AIR POLLUTION ON LOW INCOME FAMILIES/PEOPLE

Environmental Health on Air Pollution on Low Income Families/People

Part One

Research question: How does air pollution affect overall life expectancy on lower income families?

Research objective: To determine whether air pollution affects the life expectancy of low income families.

Hypothesis: In low income families, there is a direct relationship between air pollution and overall life expectancy.

Null Hypothesis: Air pollution does not have an effect on life expectancy among low income families.

Part Two: Literature Review

Low-income families are largely affected by air pollution, i.e. in terms of overall life expectancy. Essentially, this means that persons from low-income families exposed to air pollution tend to have high mortality rates. The said high mortality rates are caused by diseases brought about by air pollution. These are inclusive of, but they are not limited to; cardiovascular diseases, malignant neoplasms, cerebrovascular disease, heart disease, and cardiorespiratory disease.

Various authors have examined the effects of air pollution on low income families to determine whether it is responsible for the increased death risks in the said families. For instance, Hill et al. (2019) investigated the effects of air pollution on populations with inequitable income distributions in the US. Results from the regression models used revealed a close relationship...

The authors observed that lower life expectancy was associated with high levels of PM2.5 levels. The life expectancy of a population was lower in a population whose income share was at the bottom 10%. Therefore, it would be prudent to note that lower life expectancy is associated with low income and high PM2.5 levels.

Bennet et al. (2019) examined the impact or particulate matter on longevity and health. From their study, the authors found that, from the different pollutants, form air pollution, PM2.5 was related to various diseases that are caused by air pollution. Essentially, excess PM2.5 pollution was associated with cardiovascular diseases which led to high death rates. The said death rates were more in adults who were middle aged while they declined in older ages (Bennet et al., 2019). In addition, loss of life expectancy owing to PM2.5 was high in countries that had low income compared to counties that were wealthy....

…level of air pollution exposure (Finkelstein et al., 2003). High mortality rates may therefore be due to health issues caused by high levels of particulate matter (PM2.5) in the air.

Air pollution affects the overall life expectancy among low-income families. Results conducted from one study show a relationship between health, air pollution, and inequitable income distribution. Another study observed that health and longevity were linked to the impacts of particulate matter. From the said studies, overall life expectancy could be related to income levels, pollution, and health. However, care must be taken while referring to the results of the said studies. This is more so the case given that the study conducted by Bennet et al. (2019) was only observation - essentially meaning that it cannot be guaranteed as being causal. Studies conducted by Hill et al. (2019) included only the urban areas. In addition, while the studies conducted by Finkelstein et al. (2019) involved measuring and monitoring data, data used on this front was only limited to ten years. Therefore, future studies that include rural areas and include data for several years should…