Beijing, China’s capital, is seeing a huge increase in lung cancer cases. Although Chinese officials attribute the high number of cases to smoking, air pollution has been identified as another major cause of lung cancer in the country.
According to the state-run Xinhua news agency, the number of lung cancer cases per 100,000 people in Beijing was 39.56 in 2002, but has soared to 63.09 by 2011.
The levels of air pollution in China have been receiving a lot of press lately. Last week, Xinhua News Agency identified China’s youngest lung cancer patient: an 8-year-old girl. Doctors from the Jiangsu Cancer Hospital said that the smog in the Jiangsu province was most likely the cause of the girl’s cancer. The government also recently shut down roads, schools, and the airport in the city of Harbin, as the air pollution level hit 40 times higher than the safe limit set by the World Health Organization (WHO).
