Hell on Earth?

That's what New Delhi sounds like in this article by Gardiner Harris, a NY Times reporter who spent the past three years there. His 8 year-old son's breathing problems were significantly worsened while there. Had he stayed in America, the problems would have lessened. In Delhi, half the kids in school have breathing problems. But it is more than the kids who have problems caused by pollution. Harris writes, "it is in Delhi — among the most populous, polluted, unsanitary and bacterially unsafe cities on earth — where the new calculus seems most urgent. The city’s air is more than twice as polluted as Beijing’s, according to the World Health Organization. (India, in fact, has 13 of the world’s 25 most polluted cities, while Lanzhou is the only Chinese city among the worst 50; Beijing ranks 79th.)"

But it's not just the air that inflicts harm. Half the population, about 600 million Indians, defecate outdoors, and most of the effluent, even from toilets, is dumped untreated into rivers and streams. Add the efforts of animals and shit can turn up anywhere, even in the shower.

And then there are the fires. "In some places in Delhi, the levels of fine particles that cause the most lung damage, called PM2.5, routinely exceed 1,000 in winter in part because small trash and other fires are so common, according to scientists. In Beijing, PM2.5 levels that exceed 500 make international headlines; here, levels twice that high are largely ignored."

Water is polluted. Air is polluted. What's left?