CPCB/DHR Environmental Training Programme on Indoor & Outdoor Air Pollution, Standards & Impacts on Human Health: Case Studies

By Tricitynews Reporter

Chandigarh 07^th December:- A three day residential training programme on the ‘Air Pollution and Human Health: Case Studies’ started today  at School of Public Health, PGIMER. The training programme is being organized by School of Public Health, PGIMER in collaboration with Department of Environment Studies, Panjab University (PU) and is sponsored by Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB)-Delhi and Department of Health Research-Delhi.

Over 50 participants including public health practitioners, medical professionals, pollution control board representatives, environmentalists and researchers representing over 15 states attended the training programme. This environmental training programme will raise the knowledge about the air pollutants, exposure pathways and health effects to better plan the air pollution control strategies and their implementation to reduce the burden of air pollution related deaths and diseases.

Professor Mukesh Khare from Indian Institute of Technology-Delhi delivered a keynote lecture and he mentioned that to better plan the air pollution control in Indian cities, first step is to identify the major sources of air pollutants using source apportionment techniques. Further, he stressed that air pollutants may have different sources in different cities; hence source apportionment studies should be conducted for better control of air pollution. Surender Paul, Director, Indian Meteorology Department-Chandigarh inaugurated the training programme and highlighted that air pollution cannot be ignored and immediate steps are required to reduce the air pollution.

Dr. Ravindra Khaiwal, Organizing Secretary and Associate Professor of Environment Health highlighted that workshop aims to build capacity of the participants to better measure the air pollutants and plan health risk studies in their respective states as an aid to policy measure. Dr. Suman Mor, Coordinator, Centre for Public Health emphasized that this environmental training programme provide an excellent opportunity for the scientist, policy makers and administrators to learn and share best practices to better plan air pollution control strategies in their respective cities.   

Dr. Sreekanth, University of Washington, Seattle explained how long-term and short-term exposure to air pollutants  can be linked to linked to a range of adverse health effects such as respiratory infections or cardiovascular diseases.  He also mentioned that cities can expand air quality monitoring using alternative methods such as satellite imagery and low cost monitoring to generate baseline data and including health related data to support policy and to inform general population. 

Dr Vinayak Sinha, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research-Mohali highlighted that air pollutants in the presence of sunlight and ground level ozone can produce more toxic pollutants. Dr Siby John, Professor, Punjab Engineering College, highlighted that existing infrastructure of medical institute, engineering institutes and universities should be explored to build a network of air pollution exposure and health risk studies.