Director PGIMER Inaugurates Multicity Real-Time Mobile Air Quality Campaign over North India

By 121 News

Chandigarh 12^th Mar, 2019:- Prof. Jagat Ram, Director, Post-graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) inaugurated the multicity summer air quality campaign jointly being conducted by Department of Community Medicine and School of Public Health, PGIMER, Chandigarh and Panjab University, Chandigarh in collaboration with Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM), Pune. The air quality in Haryana and Punjab will be monitored using state of the art continuous 'Air Quality Laboratory on Wheels.'

Prof. Jagat Ram, appreciated Department of Community Medicine and School of Public Health, PGIMER, for taking the lead in 'Air Quality and Heath' research. He stressed that the Chandigarh and neighbouring states should be benefited from the presence of 'Air Quality Lab on Wheels.' Further, he added that such initiatives are needed to understand better the air pollution and its association with various diseases such as stroke, heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, lung cancer, and acute respiratory infections to plan risks reduction measures. 

Prof. Arvind Rajwanshi, Dean, PGIMER stressed that more such collaborative steps should be taken to address issues that affect public health. Prof Arun Aggarwal, Department of Community Medicine and School of Public Health, PGIMER, mentioned that air quality data generated using the mobile van could be used to create awareness about the air pollution and motivate them to curb their emissions.

Dr. Ravindra Khaiwal, Additional Professor of Environment Health, PGI, mentioned that multicity campaign would be useful to better understand the air quality in tier II cities and to support national clean air programme (NCAP). He added that NCAP is recently launched in January 2019 by Government of India to reduce air pollution by 20-30% in over 102 cities of India including Chandigarh by 2024. 

This air quality laboratory on wheels will conduct a week measurement in Chandigarh and is placed in Sector 25, Panjab University, Chandigarh. School Students, researchers and other interested citizen are welcome to visit and learn about air quality. 

Dr. Ravindra Khaiwal, Additional Professor of Environment Health, School of Public Health, PGIMER, Chandigarh and Dr. Suman Mor, Panjab University, Chandigarh together with IITM, Pune are jointly coordinating this air quality monitoring campaign. This monitoring will be conducted in eight cities of Haryana and Punjab including Chandigarhto understands the relation between air quality, meteorology, and Health.