QuartzNews

Most people we spoke to in and around Korba don't think about climate change. And that's not surprising.

The average worker in and around the city is poor and not educated. That means their biggest worry is whether they can afford food the next day, pay rent the next week, and pay utility bills for the month. This hierarchy of needs, one environmental advocate explained to me, stops those who are affected by pollution and likely soon climate change from thinking about the big problem.

Environmental activists have worked with some of the most affected people and explained to them the connection between coal and climate change. Many of them are farmers and understand instinctually when they are able to connect the changing weather patters on a year-to-year basis to climate change more generally.

Broader awareness is starting to happen organically, too. Some who have worked in mines and power plants for decades have been able to send their children to get higher education. I met an engineer who had come back after completing his education to help his fellow villagers realize the injustices they are suffering and organize a movement to bring about change.

But there's a long way to go in raising awareness. We'll need to raise living standards, get more people educated, and provide journalism that serves them.

Hi there! So the biggest thing to know is that fine pollution particles like PM 10 or PM 2.5 are toxic to the human body, and especially for little kids. Being exposed to high levels of these particles on a daily basis increases kids' risk of asthma and recurring or chronic respiratory conditions, impairs lung function, and has also been linked to lower cognitive development, meaning that it can actually get in the way of the normal development of children's brains. In adults, fine air pollution particles can increase your risk of heart disease, respiratory infections, and serious cases of asthma, among other things.

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The World Health Organization estimates that "worldwide ambient air pollution accounts for 29% of all deaths and disease from lung cancer, 17% of all deaths and disease from acute lower respiratory infection, 24% of all deaths from stroke, 25% of all deaths and disease from ischaemic heart disease, and 43% of all deaths and disease from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease." https://www.who.int/airpollution/ambient/health-impacts/en/

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To cut a long story short: it's really, really bad for you.

That's a great question with a complicated answer. The government banned internal migration into Ulaanbaatar until 2020 to try to to limit the number of people contributing to the city's air pollution problem (More people means more coal-burning chimneys, more traffic jams, overcrowded schools, and electricity shortages). They've banned the use of unrefined coal in Ulaanbaatar starting in May 2019 and offered to subsidize electricity for poor households in ger districts at nights. They've also committed to a pollution-free Ulaanbaatar by 2020 in their Sustainable Vision. And they've worked with international partners like the World Bank and the UN to install air filters in hospitals and schools. https://montsame.mn/en/read/132984

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But a lot of people I spoke with in Mongolia said the government isn't doing enough. They compared these efforts to putting a bandaid on a bullet wound: The only thing that will really help is getting rid of all coal burning in the city and transitioning to clean energy. But like I wrote, that would mean "connecting all ger district houses to a central heating system; improving the city’s electric capacity; subsidizing electricity so it’s cheap enough that people can transition from coal; insulating and upgrading buildings to make them more sustainable; and moving all the coal power plants out of the city." And that's expensive and a logistical nightmare.

Great questions. There's definitely still stigma, but I think we’ll see these drugs legalized for medical use. Israel approved MDMA to treat PTSD in compassionate cases (so, for people not involved in a clinical trial but who are suffering from PTSD and haven’t improved from other treatments) earlier this year. A similar trial is in advanced stages in the United States, and the organization behind it, MAPS, has also applied to use MDMA in compassionate cases. So I think there’s a good chance we could see MDMA used for medical purposes in the next year. A stage three trial on psilocybin (the psychedelic in magic mushrooms) to treat depression was given “breakthrough therapy” designation by the FDA last year, meaning it’ll be hastened through the drug-development process. So magic mushrooms I think are also likely to be legalized for medical uses in the next few years.

Re the dangers: All the researchers I’ve spoken to emphasize that these drugs have serious risks. One concern is that their medical benefits are overhyped, and then when someone with severe depression or PTSD isn’t immediately cured by psychedelic therapy, they can feel even more despondent. Bad trips can also be very psychologically traumatic, which is why psychedelic therapy is quite an intensive process. The current standard is for there to be two therapists to guide the psychedelic experience, and several therapy sessions both before and after the psychedelic trip.

I don’t think a hot dog is a sandwich, but I also don’t mind because I don’t like hot dogs.

They really are small. If you're curious to see how they travel inside the human body to cause all these health problems, I recommend this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QcS3ovdsgNI&feature=youtu.be

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To be transparent, I actually had to look up the answer to your question. A nomadic yurt in Mongolia is a very different beast from an apartment or house in the US. But the EPA has a handy guide listing some of the best things you can do to protect yourself from indoor air pollution in a private residence, including installing air filters that are designed to block out pollutants and increasing ventilation sources in your home (though if ambient air pollution is bad in your city, you may want to avoid bringing outside air in): https://www.epa.gov/indoor-air-quality-iaq/improving-indoor-air-quality