Only seven countries met WHO air standards in 2023, report says

Only seven countriesand three territories last year met World Health Organization pollution guidelines for fine particulate matter, the most risky for...

Only seven countriesand three territories last year met World Health Organization pollution guidelines for fine particulate matter, the most risky form of pollution to human health.

A report published Tuesday by the Swiss company IQAir looked at fine particular matter pollution (also known as PM 2.5) data collected by more than 30,000 ground-level air quality monitoring stations across 134 countries last year.

Of these countries, seven had annual averages withinthe WHO’s guidelines of 5 micrograms per cubic meter in 2023: Australia, Estonia, Finland, Grenada, Iceland, Mauritius and New Zealand. French Polynesia, Bermuda and Puerto Rico also met the guidelines.

The United States ranked as the 33rd least polluted country, according to the report, with an average annual PM2.5 concentration of 9.1 micrograms per cubic meter.Columbus, Ohio, was the most polluted major U.S. city and Las Vegas was the least.

Last month, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency finalized stricter standards for fine particulate matter, lowering the annual standard from 12 micrograms per cubic meter to 9 micrograms, a move it said reflects "new science on harms caused by particle pollution.”