Life Tradeoffs

For John, BLUF:  Per "A Guide to Longevity Throughout History, From the Prehistoric Onward", life span has doubled since around 1800.  But, there were costs.  Nothing to see here; just move along.

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Air pollution caused 400,000 premature deaths in Europe

From The New York Post, by Reuters, 16 October 2019.

Here is the lede plus four:

Poor air quality caused about 400,000 premature deaths in Europe in 2016, the most recent year data is available and almost every city-dwelling European is exposed to pollution levels that exceed healthy levels, according to a report on Wednesday.

“Air pollution is currently the most important environmental risk to human health,” the European Environment Agency (EEA), the EU’s health agency, said in the report.

The report’s author, EEA air quality expert Alberto González Ortiz, said that while the level of dangerous particles in European cities was dropping, it was not dropping fast enough.

“We have not yet reached the EU standards and of course we are far from reaching the WHO (World Health Organization) standards,” Ortiz said.

EU law currently requires countries to assess the level, notably in urban areas, of a range of pollutants, including ozone and particulate matter and take action if certain limits are hit.

So, what are the tradeoffs?  I assume we all attribute these deaths to pollution from the industrial revolution.  Thus, the question is, how much would we trade off to save those 400,000 lives?  And, the Supplementary Question:  How many additional early deaths would accrue from giving up the some of the benefits of modernity?

Hat tip to the InstaPundit.

Regards  —  Cliff