https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-05/ysop-icq052020.php
While the Trump administration is rolling back anti-pollution regulations.
News Release 20-May-2020
Yale School of Public Health
Soon after coronavirus appeared, an all-encompassing quarantine put into effect by the Chinese government slowed the spread of the disease and saved lives, but the quarantine also produced another unanticipated health benefit.
A new study led by researchers at the Yale School of Public Health and published in the journal Lancet Planetary Health, finds that China's countrywide ban on traffic mobility from February 10 to March 14 greatly limited automobile emissions and sharply reduced the country's often severe air pollution.
The improved air quality, in turn, prevented thousands of pollution-related deaths. More premature deaths were avoided by cleaner air--an estimated 12,125--than lives lost from the pandemic--4,633 as of May 4, the study finds.
"This is a very surprising result. The pandemic continues to be a terrible thing for China and the rest of the world, but the decrease in emissions that accompanied it has actually conferred some positive health results," said Kai Chen, assistant professor at the Yale School of Public Health and the study's first author. "The question is, how can we have one without the other?"
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