UNICEF called on almost 200 governments,
which will meet in Morocco from Nov 7-18 for talks on global warming, to restrict
use of fossil fuels to give twin benefits of improved health and slower climate
change. About 300 million children, or almost one
in seven worldwide, lived in areas where outdoor pollution was highest, defined
by UNICEF as at least six times international guidelines set by the World
Health Organization (WHO), it said. Of the total, 220 million lived in South
Asia. It identified the regions with satellite imagery developed by NASA. UNICEF executive director Anthony Lake said
air pollution was a "major contributing factor in the deaths of around
600,000 children under five every year", causing illnesses such as
pneumonia. "Pollutants don't only harm children's
developing lungs - they can actually cross the blood-brain barrier and
permanently damage their developing brains - and, thus, their futures," he
said in a statement. "Air pollution affects poor children
the most," Nicholas Rees, a UNICEF specialist on climate and economic
analysis who wrote the report, told Reuters. Worldwide, the WHO estimates that outdoor
air pollution killed 3.7 million people in 2012, including 127,000 children
aged under five. Factories, power plants and vehicles using fossil fuels, dust
and burning of waste were among sources. Indoor air pollution, often caused by coal-
or wood-burning cooking stoves used in homes in developing nations, killed even
more people, 4.3 million, of whom 531,000 were aged under five, it said. UNICEF called on the UN-led meeting in
Morocco to hasten a shift from fossil fuels to cleaner energies such as wind or
solar power, to improve children's access to health care, limit children's
exposure to pollution and to step up monitoring of the air.