{"id":17529,"date":"2021-06-14T09:00:16","date_gmt":"2021-06-14T13:00:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/?p=17529"},"modified":"2021-05-27T11:28:38","modified_gmt":"2021-05-27T15:28:38","slug":"dietary-choices-affect-air-quality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/2021\/06\/14\/dietary-choices-affect-air-quality\/","title":{"rendered":"Dietary Choices Affect Air Quality"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"\"
image from httpwww.actforbays.org<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

By Reed Mangels, PhD, RD<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Did you know that around 100,000 people in the United States\ndie prematurely each year due to air pollution resulting from human activities\n(like driving)? And that about 20,000 of those deaths are linked to\nagriculture? I had no idea of this issue until I read a recently published\nstudy conducted by scientists from the United States and the United Kingdom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This study attributed 15,900 deaths per year in the United\nStates to air pollution related to food production and estimates that 80% of\nthese deaths are related to animal-based food production. There are numerous\nways that food production contributes to air pollution. For example, livestock\nwaste (urine and feces) and fertilizer applications result in ammonia\nproduction. Ammonia is estimated to be associated with 69% of deaths related to\nair quality from food production. Particulate matter from dust from tillage,\ndust kicked up by livestock hooves, field burning, and emissions from\nagricultural equipment is estimated to be associated with 27% of food\nproduction air quality-related deaths. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Red meat production has the greatest impact on health damage\nrelated to air quality. The health effect of red meat production on air quality\nis estimated to be 10 times higher than that of nut and seed production and 15\ntimes more than that of the production of other plant foods. Production of\neggs, poultry, and dairy products all have a greater impact on deaths\nattributed to food production air quality than does production of plant foods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The researchers developed mathematical models to predict the\neffect of dietary changes in the United States on deaths due to\nagricultural-related air quality. Substituting poultry for red meat would\npotentially result in a 40% decrease in deaths, shifting to a vegetarian diet\nwould potentially decrease deaths attributed to air pollution related to food\nproduction by 76%, and a shift to a vegan diet would potentially decrease\ndeaths by 83%. Thus, a national shift to a vegan diet could prevent more than\n13,000 deaths per year from food production-related air pollution alone. That\u2019s\nnot to mention other environmental and health benefits. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reference:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Domingo NGG, Balasubramanian S, Thakrar SK, et al. Air quality-related health damages of food. Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A<\/em>. 2021;118(20):e2013637118. <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Reed Mangels, PhD, RD Did you know that around 100,000 people in the United States die prematurely each year due to air pollution resulting from human activities (like driving)? And that about 20,000 of those deaths are linked to agriculture? I had no idea of this issue until I read a recently published study […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17529","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17529","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17529"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17529\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17531,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17529\/revisions\/17531"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17529"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17529"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17529"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}