The youngest child ever to get lung cancer is, unsurprisingly, in China. ‘An eight-year-old girl, living near a major road in the Jiangsu Province of Eastern China, has become the youngest person in China, and possibly in the world, to be diagnosed with lung cancer caused by pollution—the cause of her disease according to Chinese officials. And last month, the World Health Organization classified air pollution as a major human carcinogen.’ The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s standard is an annual average of 15 micrograms per cubic meter of air, though they allow for daily spikes of up to 35. This may seem like a lot, but in comparison, Beijing regularly receives readings of 800-900, or even 1000! The Chinese government is not taking an active role in monitoring air pollution levels, and as a result, young children, the new leaders of this world, are paying the price.

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• A Chinese Child’s Lung Cancer Is Linked to Pollution (news.nationalgeographic.com)