AIIMS Develops Device To Fight Air Pollution

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Air pollution is one of the rising health concern across the country. The pollution level is rising beyond the permissible limits across all the major Indian cities affecting millions of people.

As a result, many people residing in these tier 1 cities are falling easy prey to asthma, sneezing, lung infection and a host of other serious health issues.

Keeping in mind this major health concern, the All India Institute Of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) in association with the researchers from the Indian Institute Of Technology (IIT), Delhi have developed a wearable nasal device that helps in preventing all pollutants from entering the lungs.

The new device has been named as 'Airlens'. The device is about 2cms long and it helps trap the pollutants. In addition to this, the device als helps in bringing the trapped pollutants to a safe level depending on the air quality outside.

The device has been developed by five researchers--Ranjan, Debayan Saha, Yogesh Agarwal, Akanksha Gupta and Harsh Sheth and was launched on Wednesday.

According to the researchers, the device initially would be for children aged above 6 years and is priced at Rs 500. The team has applied for the patent in the name of PerSapien which stands for saving (per) each (sapien) human life.

The device is a use and throw one and it does not need to be attached to anything, said one of the researcher.

Air pollution can be permed as a silent killer. According to a recent report published in the Lancet journal, India had the world's highest number of deaths due to air, water and other forms of pollution in 2015. It showed that pollution killed as many as 2.5 million people in the country.

Most of these deaths are due to non-communicable diseases caused by pollution such as heart disease, stroke, lung cancer and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), researchers said.

Know how air pollution affects your health. Take a look.

Heart:

Exposure to high level of pollution can lead to lowering of the good cholesterol level in the body. This has been suggested by several studies. When the good cholesterol level lowers down this can affect the heart and lead to several heart related problems.

Lung Cancer:

When the polluted air containing several particulate matter enters your system, your lung is the first thing that gets affected. Continuous exposure to contaminated pollutants can affect the lungs and can lead to lung cancer in the long run.

Kidneys:

A study conducted by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in the US has pointed out that air pollution can affect the kidneys as well. Like the fine particles that comes along with the air pollutants can affect the kidneys in the same way like it affects other organs like the lungs and the heart.

Dementia:

Air pollution has a serious impact on the major body organs. Well, this isn't all. In addition to this, air pollution can also increase the risk of dementia. Meanwhile, a study has pointed that elderly women who are exposed to air pollution continuously are at an increased risk of developing dementia and alzheimer's disease as well.

(With Agency Inputs)