A study released on Wednesday by the Sao Paulo University's (USP) Air Pollution Lab said air pollution is more lethal than AIDS and traffic accidents.
The study said diseases caused by pollution results in about nine deaths a day in Sao Paulo, or 3,500 deaths a year, while AIDS and traffic accidents together caused 1,624 deaths in 2007.
The study estimates that the Sao Paulo metropolitan area's government spends 1.5 billion U.S. dollars on pollution-caused diseases.
The six million vehicles in the city are mainly to be blamed for the air pollution in Sal Paulo.
Diesel-fueled vehicles, which represent 10 percent of the total, release 62 percent of air pollutants.
The reduction of sulfur released by diesel-fueled vehicles could save 150 lives a year. The figure is not too far from the 232 deaths caused by AIDS in the city last year, a professor in the Air Pollution Lab said.
The city will reduce at least 5 percent of the pollution in 2009 with the adoption of the so-called "clean diesel", which has a lower concentration of sulfur, the professor said.
Source: Xinhua
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