Dirty, Polluted Air in Beijing Right Before the Olympics

The smog levels in Beijing right now are 5 times the safety limit. Chinese officials have thrown their hands up, saying they can’t do anything about it. Pollution tests by the Sunday Times confirmed that the levels are far above the standards set by the World Health Organization.

From the Times Online:

With just five weeks to go before the start of the Beijing Games, tests conducted outside the national stadium — known as the Bird’s Nest — and at Tiananmen Square, the starting point of the marathon, showed the air is thick with particulate pollution.

Even the Chinese government’s official air pollution index — which monitors a range of pollutants, including carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide — is running at double the level recommended by the WHO.

Du Shaozhong, deputy director of Beijing’s Environmental Protection Bureau, said: “We made a commitment to ensure air quality for the Olympic Games . . . as for whether we have reached the goal, that will be examined after the event.”

This has led many Olympic athletes to worry about whether they’ll be able to perform at their best. Haile Gebrselassie, the world’s leading long distance runner, has already pulled out of the games due to his athsma. The British team is training in Macau on the southern coast until the last minute to avoid the pollution as long as possible before the games start.

We’re calling it - the Olympics in Beijing are going to be a messy clusterfuck.

Link [Times Online]
Photo credit: Flickr user borkur.net

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