PBS高端访谈:全球每6人中就有1人死于污染

 　　According to a study published this week pollution of all kinds can be blamed for nine million premature¹ deaths around the world every year.

　　The study by the environmental nonprofit pure earth and published in The Lancet blamed air pollution for six and a half million deaths and water pollution for close to 2 million more.

　　One of the study's authors, Richard Fuller, joins me now to go over the details.

　　First of all nine million people are going to say, wait how do you how do you calculate that?

　　How do you get to a number this big? It's done using statistics that come out of two different organizations

　　World Health Organization in Geneva, and the Institute of Health Metrics and Evaluation² in the University of Washington which is funded by the Gates Foundation.

　　And what those folks do independently do is collect statistics on what people are dying from country to country

　　and then look to allocate³ those deaths according to certain types of risks.

　　So for example, when you are exposed to air pollution one of the things that could happen is you could get lung cancer.

　　The same way you can would you get smoking. So these groups will allocate lung cancer deaths into five or six different causes

　　and we'll pick up all those that are related to pollution and aggregate⁴ them in this particular analysis.

　　Well one of the things that's most striking is the distribution of where these deaths are occurring.

　　Ninety two percent in low and middle income countries. It's a development issue.

　　This is something that the West has looked after reasonably well.

　　We still have pollution deaths here in the U.S. of course, but at a much lower level than you see in the poorer countries of the world.

　　So it's as if we put in all the right controls in the 50s and 60s.

　　So on clean air, clean water and all these acts came about, and we've been monitoring and controlling emissions⁵.

　　Overseas, they've industrialized and there's also this enormous draw into cities where pollution can concentrate

　　and they just haven't had the same results that we have in terms of their own legislative⁶ and regulatory performance.

　　Even if you look beyond the horrendous⁷ totals that you're talking about,

　　a graphic⁸ says that three times more than HIV, lung cancer, and malaria⁹, and also is 15 times more than people that are dying by war!

　　War and murder. All of the murders in the world all of the gun deaths and and and anything that's violent 15 times more than that.

　　And even if you set that aside for a second which is still ringing in my ears,

　　this actually costs the kind of economic productivity of the entire planet as well.

　　We looked at it based on welfare costs and that number is just staggering -- it's 4.6 trillion dollars a year.

　　So people are getting sick and can't work and they're dying before they've had a productive life.

　　So there are costs associated to that with the economy. We when we calculate that in low and middle income countries, it's 2 percent of the GDP.

　　So if countries to focus on pollution and prioritize that, which of course is one of our main recommendations, that's how much they could add potentially.

　　You know there's also been this common misnomer¹⁰ that countries have to go through some sort of a development cycle

　　and this is the period where they're going to be dirtier or it's going to be polluting.

　　But you're also pointing out in this study that there's actually economic opportunity and cleaning up.

　　Yes, you can have very strong solid growth that is effective and hits all parts of society in a very clean and green economy.

　　So this old myth we need to knock it on the head. Busted¹¹. undefined

1 premature   

adj.比预期时间早的；不成熟的，仓促的

参考例句：

• It is yet premature to predict the possible outcome of the dialogue.预言这次对话可能有什么结果为时尚早。
• The premature baby is doing well.那个早产的婴儿很健康。

2 evaluation   

n.估价，评价；赋值

参考例句：

• I attempted an honest evaluation of my own life.我试图如实地评价我自己的一生。
• The new scheme is still under evaluation.新方案还在评估阶段。

3 allocate   

vt.分配，分派；把…拨给；把…划归

参考例句：

• You must allocate the money carefully.你们必须谨慎地分配钱。
• They will allocate fund for housing.他们将拨出经费建房。

4 aggregate   

adj.总计的，集合的；n.总数；v.合计；集合

参考例句：

• The football team had a low goal aggregate last season.这支足球队上个赛季的进球总数很少。
• The money collected will aggregate a thousand dollars.进帐总额将达一千美元。

5 emissions   

排放物( emission的名词复数 )； 散发物（尤指气体）

参考例句：

• Most scientists accept that climate change is linked to carbon emissions. 大多数科学家都相信气候变化与排放的含碳气体有关。
• Dangerous emissions radiate from plutonium. 危险的辐射物从钚放散出来。

6 legislative   

n.立法机构，立法权；adj.立法的，有立法权的

参考例句：

• Congress is the legislative branch of the U.S. government.国会是美国政府的立法部门。
• Today's hearing was just the first step in the legislative process.今天的听证会只是展开立法程序的第一步。

7 horrendous   

adj.可怕的，令人惊惧的

参考例句：

• He described it as the most horrendous experience of his life.他形容这是自己一生中最可怕的经历。
• The mining industry in China has a horrendous safety record.中国的煤矿工业具有令人不安的安全记录。

8 graphic   

adj.生动的，形象的，绘画的，文字的，图表的

参考例句：

• The book gave a graphic description of the war.这本书生动地描述了战争的情况。
• Distinguish important text items in lists with graphic icons.用图标来区分重要的文本项。

9 malaria   

n.疟疾

参考例句：

• He had frequent attacks of malaria.他常患疟疾。
• Malaria is a kind of serious malady.疟疾是一种严重的疾病。

10 misnomer   

n.误称

参考例句：

• Herbal"tea"is something of a misnomer because these drinks contain no tea at all.花草“茶”是一个误称，因为这类饮料里面根本不含茶。
• Actually," Underground "is a misnomer,because more than half the shops are above ground.实际上，“ 地下 ” 这个名称用之不当，因为半数以上的店铺是在地面上的。

11 busted   

adj. 破产了的，失败了的，被降级的，被逮捕的，被抓到的 动词bust的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• You are so busted! 你被当场逮住了！
• It was money troubles that busted up their marriage. 是金钱纠纷使他们的婚姻破裂了。