responce to student artical

REED THE ARTICAL BELLOW AND MAKE A CONSTRUCTIVE RESPONCE IN 250 WORDS 

THE WORK DUE AFTER 16 HRS 

THIS ARTICAL WROTE BY A STUDENT HIS NAME IS "Caleb Aguilar"

We all know that the US is one of the biggest contributors to all kinds of pollution, including air pollution, in the world. But we, the US, also make an effort to try and reduce our contribution to pollution. In the US regulation of air emissions and industries clash, too much regulation affects the economy of these industries negatively but at the same time regulation helps improve public health. Health and economics are usually completely separate from each other but a scientist from Carnegie Mellon University, named Paulina Jaramillo, did a study over whether a dollar amount could be placed on the savings created by improved air quality. Apparently there is a statistical indicator called the the "value of a statistical life," or VSL, that basically estimates how much society is willing to spend on saving one life. According to the government on average it is around $6 million right now. The VSL indicator is a major part of the cost of air pollution to society, in the study Jaramillo took data from the effects of air pollution on crops, forests and human health. The cost of air pollution found in this data is mostly due to the VSL. The reduction of air pollution has led to a decrease in the annual cost of air pollution of 25%, to $130 billion, which to me still seems like a lot. This decrease was mostly due to two factors, the incorporation of new regulations and, surprisingly, the recent Recession, which led to less demand of energy and higher use of cleaner sources like natural gas. " Reducing these emissions reduced health impacts. These models cannot pinpoint who specifically benefited, but on a population basis there are benefits," says Jaramillo.

  The models can't show who these people who have benefited are, but according the article others can. Emergency room doctors are an example given in the article. A physician namedArvind Venkat from Pittsburgh says although people often come in with colds or allergic reactions, there are underlying factors which include air pollution. Studies have also found that ER visits for heart and lung conditions are highest on days that air pollution is higher. ER visits usually cost around $1000 and the reduction of air pollution eliminates, to some extent, the effect that air pollution has on peoples' health conditions. Air pollution is a problem and will continue to be a problem in many different things, the most obvious is the environment and people's health. I had never considered pollution could have anything to do with the economy and that there was an actual value to the life of an individual.

  In recent years 200 coal-powered power plants have been shut down which has led to this reduction of emissions and the data collected after these shut downs has shown and reinforced the improvement of public health and lowered the overall cost of society. These results have led Jaramillo to a very simple conclusion that I agree with completely, " We need to continue regulating these emissions and putting controls on these emissions."