Mexico City. Mexico is among the 10 countries with the largest population exposed to “unsafe and dangerous concentrations” of air pollution, 93.3 percent of its inhabitants live on the edge of getting sick from exposure to micrometric particles that the respiratory system does not filter; while, added to the cost of subsidizing fossil fuels, the financial burden on the health sector is added, reported the World Bank.
According to the organization, the health costs of environmental air pollution are equivalent to 4 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), in addition to fuel subsidies that, for example, last year reached 397,000 millions of pesos. The World Bank emphasized that despite the initiatives to gradually remove the fuel subsidy, air pollution is a “huge” problem in the country; In 2019 alone, it caused more than 46,000 premature deaths.
Mexico is the tenth country with the largest population exposed to harmful levels of particulate matter —dust, soot, cement, ashes, and metals less than a human hair thickness—derived from all kinds of combustion and are triggers for cardiovascular and respiratory diseases. China heads the list, followed by India, the United States, Indonesia, Pakistan, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Brazil and Russia.
In a new report, the agency stresses that global subsidies for fossil fuels, agriculture and fisheries exceed $7 trillion, representing about 8 percent of global GDP. Direct taxes alone, carried out via the public budget, add up to around 1.25 trillion dollars, approximately the size of the Mexican economy.
The agency reported that countries spend six times more to subsidize the consumption of fossil fuels than the commitments made under the Paris Agreement to address climate change. And usually the tax incentives for the consumption of these energy sources benefit the population with higher incomes. In Mexico, for every peso that reaches the two poorest deciles of the population through these subsidies, 19.50 go to the two richest deciles, according to the World Bank comparison.
“Governments are spending trillions on inefficient subsidies that are making climate change worse, money that could be used to help solve the problem,” the agency emphasized. He highlighted that, among them, agricultural subsidies are responsible for 14 percent of global deforestation; those given to fossil fuels, and which incentivize their use, are a factor in the 7 million premature deaths each year due to air pollution; and those who go fishing exceed 35 billion each year, which contributes to the decline in fish populations.
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