I kill 7–8 million people globally in a year!

I am a topical issue in the world today!

About 520 million children in Africa alone breathe me

I am the silent killer but my case cannot be assessed in most parts of Africa

A similar scenario in other logistically difficult environments

I was told humans have the right to breathe clean air

But I sneak into the their environment through their own actions…

Increasing vehicle fleet

Dusty environments

Dirty fuels for energy

Burning of biomass for energy

Industrialisation

Neglect of renewable and green energy

The list goes on but again

I find my way into the placentas of mothers’

I find my way to confuse the elders who are responsible for making decisions

By breathing my content CO

I give them headaches and sometimes poison them to death

Yet they do nothing about me

The agencies in these regions cannot assess the degree of my impact on health

Because they lack data and do not employ the use of emerging technologies to monitor me

Part of my contents quickly break down to the form ozone!

Funnily I contribute to climate change yet policy makers do not see the need to merge the fight against me and climate change

It was once so clean and serene here

Children playing in the rain and under the shelter of the forests

But the leaders are hungry for the industries

And our increasing population want a “comfortable life”

So I come in again!

I aggravate the cases of asthma

I cause respiratory problems just with my part nitrogen dioxide

The diesel cars emit more of me

Many old ones without catalytic converters

I smile and just say Oh goodness

Let them breathe me

I am an economic burden

I kill more than HIV/AIDs and malaria

But they don’t talk about me

Such a funny world they live in

I contribute to cancer

And the tiny part of me goes even into the brain and bloodstream

The particulates that forms me they breathe

I have been wondering if they will ever fight me

I have been wondering if they will ever take actions

Their goals are many so the available resources are not put into the fight against me

Yet they die gradually by breathing me

Knowingly or unknowingly

Because I have found myself in a system lacking surveillance

I will keep killing them slowly

Until they fight me

Until they properly plan their cities

Until they monitor me to really understand my behaviour

Until they develop integrated policies to fight me and climate change

Until they take a holistic action

Until they change attitude

Until they scrap the old cars on their roads

Until they really understand my behaviour!”

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