Two weeks ago it was revealed that an eight-year-old girl living in China's Guangzhou province
had become the country's youngest lung cancer patient with doctors pointing to China's high
levels of pollution as the cause.
Although this piece of news was really quite shocking, over the past few years we've got
pretty used to hearing about China's pollution troubles and seeing images of Chinese citizens
wearing face masks.
Take the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
When the Chinese government were forced to spend $17 billion on cleaning up the city's
pollution in time for the games.
This involved suspending work at construction sites, chemical plants, cement manufacturers,
and mines.
As well as moving entire factories to neighboring provinces.
And who could forget these before and after images taken by NASA's Terra satellite back
in January 2013.
The images show north eastern China at the beginning of the month and then ten days later
when the nation faced one of the worst periods of air quality in recent history.
Residents of Beijing and many other cities in China were warned to stay inside and at
the peak of the crisis the air quality index in Beijing measured 775.
To put this figure into context, anything below 50 is considered good while anything
above 300 is considered hazardous to humans.
And then there's the phenomenon known as cancer villages - villages in China where the number
of cancer patients is extraordinarily high as a result of pollution.
This map shows the location of 459 so-called cancer villages, 241 of them have been officially
reported by the Chinese media and government while 218 are ones that have only been reported
about on internet sites.
And all of this got us thinking about how China fairs compared to other countries when
it comes to pollution.
All of the media focus on China makes it seem like the most polluted place in the world
but is that really true?
What is true is that China's greenhouse gas emissions makes up 30% of the world's total
and that as a country it's the world's biggest polluter.
However if you consider China's greenhouse gas emissions on a per capita basis, ie the
volume emitted per Chinese citizen every year, it's a bit of a different story.
According to the most recent data provided by the world bank, when it comes to carbon
dioxide emissions per capita, China is only the 58th worst culprit.
So who are the other 57?
In at number one was oil rich Qatar emitting a whopping 40.3 metric tonnes of CO2 gas per
person compared with the 6.2 metric tonnes per person emitted by China in that same year.
Trinidad and Tobago, Kuwait, Brunei, Darsalam and Aruba made up the rest of the top five,
and the US the world's second biggest polluter after China came in at 10th place.
We should make it clear that CO2 isn't the only greenhouse gas but it is the main one
that's emitted through human activities and that's why it's usually the one that's measured
when looking for countries greenhouse gas emissions.
This handy map shows how greenhouse gas emissions per capita have changed over time, each blue
line represents a different country from around the world with some key countries represented
by coloured lines.
However the levels of greenhouse gases a country emits does not necessarily indicate how polluted
the environment of that country is.
The Blacksmith Institute is a not-for-profit organisation that looks at pollution in low
and middle income countries.
In 2007 it produced a list of what it believes were the top 10 worse polluted places in the
world based on different types of air, water, and soil pollution.
The Chinese cities of Linfen and Tianying both made the list.
Linfen is located in Shanxi province the heart of China's coal industry and residents there
claim that they literally choke on coal dust in the evenings.
While Tianying is located in Anhui Province, one of China's largest led production bases.
Residents there, particularly children, are reported to suffer from lead poisoning but
China wasn't the only country with two cities in the top spots.
Dzerzinsk and Norilsk in Russia both made the list.
As did Sukinda and Vapi in India although Vapi has since been removed due to significant
improvements.
And even when you look at just air pollution which China is particularly notorious for
is not necessarily the worst culprit.
Although the media continues to quote World Bank data from 2004, the named sixteen Chinese
cities amongst twenty of the worst polluted cities in the world, more recent data published
by the World Health Organization in 2013 reveals China to be completely absent from the top
10.
The Iranian city of Ahwaz is easily the worst city for air pollution and in total four of
the country's cities made the top 10.
While the Chinese city of Linfen, which is repeatedly been named as the most polluted
place in the world doesn't even get a look in.
So why has Iran emerged as such a surprise contender?
In Ahwaz at least, researchers apparently point to heavy industry in and around the
cities the case.
In particular oil, metal, and petro chemical processing as well as the draining of marshes
and a national project that has diverted the water away from the city.
According to BBC Persian, at the start of November 2013 thousands of the cities citizens
were admitted to hospital with breathing difficulties which were blamed by doctors on pollution.
So there you have it not exactly the most definitive answer on the most polluted place
in the world, but some stuff to ponder the next time you see yet another image of a Chinese
citizen wearing a face mask.