The cleanest and dirtiest countries. List of the most polluted cities in the world Ranking of the most polluted countries

Environmental pollution is one of the most common problems today. Emissions of harmful substances occur in almost every settlement, the only question is where their number is many times higher than the norm. In this article, we will find out in which parts of the world the ecological situation is the least comforting, which countries are the dirtiest in the world.

Sources of environmental problems

The activity of human intervention in nature is inevitably growing, reflecting not in the best way on the state of the environment. Recently, the destructive influence of our activities is felt even in remote, untouched regions of the planet.

Before we talk about the dirtiest countries in the world, let's take a look at what causes pollution. It must be said right away that man is not the only cause of pollution of the planet. Often it happens without our participation, for example, during forest fires or volcanic eruptions. However, even then the emissions of hazardous substances are not too high compared to what we produce.

Natural pollutants are substances that enter the environment in excess of the norm. It can be various microorganisms, physical radiation or chemical compounds. Most often, they end up in nature through transport, industrial enterprises, landfills, agriculture, and nuclear energy.

Even ordinary household items contribute. So, working equipment increases the noise level, computers and phones emit electromagnetic waves, lamps and heaters emit additional heat, some become a source of mercury.

Criteria for assessing the environmental situation

Ratings of the most environmentally polluted countries in the world are very conditional. As a rule, when compiling them, only some of the factors affecting the environment are taken into account. A complete assessment of the environmental situation in the regions may include the level of soil, air, water pollution, the amount of resources consumed and their conservation, the level of all kinds of radiation, etc.

Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Bangladesh, Kuwait and Cameroon have recently been leading among the countries with the most polluted air. At the same time, China (10,357 million tons), the USA (5414 million tons), India (2274 million tons), Russia (1617 million tons) and Japan (1237 million tons) were among the countries that emit the largest amount of carbon dioxide. . The dirtiest countries in terms of drinking water quality were Afghanistan, Chad and Ethiopia. Next to them are usually Ghana, Bangladesh and Rwanda.

Top dirtiest countries in the world

Problems with environmental pollution exist almost everywhere where a person is present. Some states are successfully fighting them by introducing effective technologies. Others only increase their "harmful potential", creating a danger not only for their own inhabitants, but also for the population of the entire planet. In 2017, one of the rankings of the 10 dirtiest countries in the world looked like this:

1. Kuwait.
2. Bahrain.
3. Qatar.
4. United Arab Emirates.
5. Oman.
6. Turkmenistan.
7. Libya.
8. Kazakhstan.
9. Trinidad and Tobago.

• the amount of energy consumption;
• renewable energy sources;
• air pollution;
• carbon dioxide emissions;
• number of deaths due to air pollution.

This Muslim state occupies 80% of the Arabian Peninsula and is in 13th place in the world in terms of area. Most of Saudi Arabia is represented by deserts, semi-deserts and mountains. There are no forests and permanent rivers, there is a lot of sun and heat, and fresh water is present only in underground sources.

The main resource of the state is oil and natural gas, the extraction and processing of which contributes to the emission of huge amounts of CO 2 . Due to the vast deserts, the main population is located on the coasts. The products of human activity are often thrown into the ocean, which destroys valuable coral reefs. Urban growth also results in vehicle emissions and increases the consumption of water, which is already used in large quantities to irrigate fields.

In general, the most polluted country in the world, Saudi Arabia has made the excessive use of petroleum products, high urbanization, unreasonable farming, as well as the lack of programs to introduce alternative energy sources. However, the country's authorities promise to deal with the last problem soon.

Kuwait

Kuwait is the second most environmentally polluted country in the world. It is located on the coast of the Persian Gulf, right next to Saudi Arabia. Unlike its neighbor, it is not large (only 152nd in the world in terms of territory), but it has almost the same number of environmental problems.

Kuwait, by the way, like Qatar, UAE, Oman, Bahrain, has very scarce natural resources. All of them built their economy on oil. Kuwait has approximately 10% of the total world supply of this fuel. Every year, the country produces approximately 165 million tons of black gold, which poses a threat to the purity of the air.

The danger to the environment is not only the process of resource extraction, but also the way it is stored. From wells, oil usually does not immediately enter the market, and while it waits in the wings, it periodically lights up. Then it emits CO 2 , harmful ash and other pollutants into the air. Great damage to the ecology of Kuwait was inflicted in 1990, when Iraq set fire to about 1,000 of its wells.

Libya

In the list of the dirtiest countries in the world, only Libya is in Africa. It is located in the northern part of the continent, on the Mediterranean coast. Most of the country is covered by the Sahara desert, so the climate here is mostly dry and hot. It is favorable only on the coast and in oases.

Libya is characterized by many environmental problems, such as a small supply of drinking water, desertification, water and air pollution. As in the countries of the Middle East, not without fuel resources. This African state exports oil and natural gas to various European countries (Italy, France, Germany, Spain), putting its own territories at risk.

The situation created by human activity is exacerbated by natural factors. In spring and autumn, strong sirocco or ghibli winds form in Libya. They bring hot air up to 50 degrees, dry fogs and clouds of dust. The winds blow for about five days, causing problems with the respiratory and nervous systems.

Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan is the largest state in the world in terms of area, which does not have access to the sea. Unlike its "neighbors" in the ranking, it was among the dirtiest countries not only because of oil and products based on it. Kazakhstan is the largest economy in all of Central Asia, with a huge number of different industries.

The country produces and processes non-ferrous and ferrous ores, coal, oil, natural gas, bauxite and other minerals. The most harmful are oil refineries, lead-zinc, chromium, phosphorus plants. Thanks to them, heavy metals, sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide, soot and other substances enter the air. Cars complicate the situation - the main sources of aldehydes, nitric oxide, benzpyrene, carbon monoxide and carbon dioxide.

Trinidad and Tobago

The Republic of Trinidad and Tobago is located in the Caribbean Sea, close to Venezuela. It covers two large and hundreds of small islands. Hot tropical climate, evergreen forests and savannahs, sandy beaches and unique animals... It would seem that in such a place there can be no problems with the environment. The country even began to develop ecological tourism.

However, not everything is so smooth here. The main sectors of the economy of Trinidad and Tobago are oil and gas processing, heavy industry, and the production of asphalt and fertilizers. All this led to soil erosion, a decrease in forest area, and pollution of water and the coastal strip. In The Eco Experts ranking, the emphasis was mainly on the air, with which the country is also not all right. Metallurgy and oil refining contribute to the release of many toxic substances into the atmosphere, which gradually turn a piece of paradise into an impossible place to live.

The cleanest country in the world is Switzerland— the state-leader in solving issues of environmental pollution control and problems with natural resources. The dirtiest country on the planet Iraq. But this is only in terms of the state of ecology today. In the ranking of trends in the development of the environmental situation over the past 10 years, the shameful last place is occupied by Russia. While the leading country in terms of environmental improvement from 2000 to 2010 is Latvia. The rating of the cleanest and dirtiest countries in the world, indicating the index of well-being of environmental trends in 2012, was Yale and Columbia Universities.

Top ten environmentally sound countries included, in addition to Switzerland, which took first place, small states and major European powers: Latvia (2nd place), Norway (3rd place), Luxembourg (4th place), Costa Rica (5th place), France (6th), Austria (7th), Italy (8th), Great Britain and Northern Ireland (9th), Sweden (10th). The rating once again testified to the difference between the ecology of developed and developing countries (5th place for Costa Rica and 49th for the USA is an exception to the rule). However, according to Western experts, the point is not that the major European powers transfer all their harmful production to the poor countries of the world. It's about GDP per capita, as well as investment in basic environmental goods (people's access to safe drinking water and basic sanitation). Developing countries are still on their way to providing a high standard of living for their populations, as well as moving towards more sustainable production and consumption processes.

Top ten countries with the worst environment , in addition to Iraq, which took the last place, included: Turkmenistan (131st place), Uzbekistan (130th place), Kazakhstan (129th place), South Africa (128th place), Yemen (127th place), Kuwait (126th place), India (125th place) , Bosnia and Herzegovina (124th place), Libya (123rd place). The greatest concern among health experts is caused by the ecological situation in China (116th place) and India, since 1/3 of the world's population lives in these countries. Already, air pollution in the Middle Kingdom is the biggest threat to the health of its inhabitants. According to the English newspaper The Guardian, « incidence of lung cancer in Chinese cities in 2-3 times higher than in rural areas, despite the fact that they smoke both there and there equally". Health experts predict that by 2050, air pollution will kill every year. 3.6 million human. And most of these deaths will be in India and China.

6 of the dirtiest countries in the world are also in the top 10 countries with extremely negative environmental trends (right column in the general table). The worst results in changing the environmental situation from 2000 to 2010, as mentioned above, were shown by Russia. Kuwait is in second place on this black list, Saudi Arabia is in third, followed by Bosnia and Herzegovina, Estonia, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Iraq, South Africa, and Turkmenistan closes the top ten outsiders. According to the conclusion of Western experts, Russia has demonstrated the worst trends in the change in the environmental situation due to critically low indicators in the field of environmental protection. The population of the Russian Federation uses the country's weak environmental legislation, which results in such problems as fishing and deforestation passing all permissible norms. The only environmental indicator that has improved in Russia over the past 10 years is the volume of sulfur dioxide emissions. Surprisingly, it has shrunk.

The position of our country and the nine countries of the world that have joined it looks especially sad against the background of the other participants in the rating. The vast majority of states have improved their environmental performance over the period from 2000 to 2010. Top Trends showed Latvia, in second place - Azerbaijan, in third - Romania, followed by Albania, Egypt, Angola, Slovakia, Ireland, Belgium and Thailand.

Each of the 132 countries participating in the ranking was evaluated according to 22 parameters, including: the detrimental impact of the environment on public health, the impact of polluted air and polluted water on human health, the impact of polluted atmosphere and water resources on ecosystems, the state of forests, the scale of fishing and agriculture, climate change, and much more.

Ecological card of Russia:

Ecological card of Ukraine:

Ecological card of Belarus:

Ecological card of Kazakhstan:

Ecological card of Moldova:

The main reason for the accumulation of garbage in this country is overpopulation. A huge number of factories, transport and household waste have turned almost all the reservoirs of India into garbage dumps, and the main rivers - the Indus and the Ganges - have become one of the most dangerous for humans. Another problem is animals, or rather cows. Their number is not regulated, because it is forbidden to kill cows as sacred animals. They became carriers of diseases, which in unsanitary conditions easily lead to epidemics.

In a small state there is no clear system for garbage collection, and city dwellers do not differ in love for order. All household waste accumulates near houses for years. In hot climates, all this quickly rots and emits not the most pleasant aromas. Meanwhile, the citizens of Myanmar are very concerned about the construction of 12 coal-fired power plants. Their appearance will only aggravate the ecological situation of a poor country.

India's neighbor is also overpopulated and also has the highest population density in the world. Garbage from other countries has been brought here for many years, and a small state simply does not have time to process it. Numerous waste plants also worsen the ecological state. Bangladesh has twice been on the brink of disaster. This happened for the first time when more than half of the country's population was poisoned by water with arsenic. Then the level of cancer and genetic diseases in children jumped sharply. A few years later, two oil tankers collided, and environmental pollution reached an unprecedented scale.

Afghanistan

A war has been going on in this country for many years, which is why few people care about environmental problems. Although the situation is already close to catastrophic. The only thing that is not heavily polluted here is the air. There are no factories, a lot of transport. But there is no sewerage and garbage disposal either. People pile waste in areas that often burn. Afghanistan has serious problems with drinking water, soil and groundwater.

For two decades, the African country has become a trash can for Europe. 90 percent of the waste was brought here. Almost the entire share was in the capital of the country, Lagos. The city's population has tripled, which has worsened the situation. The factories of Lagos could not keep up with everything that was imported, and the garbage of citizens accumulated, polluting the rivers and streets. Now only 10 percent of the waste is recycled, the rest remains on the streets. Humid and hot climate, coupled with dirt, contribute to epidemics and hordes of rats.

A mountainous state, the level of pollution of which is visible from space. But it's not just humans that are to blame. Frequent earthquakes have destroyed most of the infrastructure, and cities simply do not have time to process waste. Dust and warehouses of plastic reduce the life expectancy of Nepalese by an average of 4 years. The main attraction of the country - Mount Everest - has already become a victim of human negligence. Every year mountains of garbage are taken out from here, but tourists do not give a damn about the top. Therefore, the authorities are thinking of seriously limiting the flow of climbers.

Technological progress is advancing by leaps and bounds, new technologies are emerging that radically change the life of mankind. The payoff for these achievements is simple: the dirtiest city in the world - such a not at all prestigious title today is already ready to be shared by many settlements of our planet.

And if five or ten years ago the most polluted cities in the world were just large metropolitan areas, with a large population, air pollution with exhaust gases and heavy industry, now the situation has turned in a completely different direction. Modern processes of mining, production of various directions, and in some places simply the vital activity of the population, cause truly terrible natural and environmental problems.

Quick article navigation

How does this happen

How do the most polluted cities in the world appear? With the constantly rising standard of living, we are getting used to the fact that modern technology is able to provide for the slightest wishes in terms of ensuring comfort in everyday life. Such benefits of civilization seem natural and normal, because technical industries are developing, providing modern technologies in literally everything. Have you ever wondered how this actually happens?

The increased development of mines and deposits inevitably leads to pollution of the surrounding air and groundwater. Since a large amount of natural resources is constantly needed to ensure large-scale production, treatment facilities do not cope with their functions or are simply designed for a much smaller volume. The most dangerous situation is created in low-income countries where no funds are allocated to maintain the environment.

The TOP of the dirtiest cities in the world is constantly updated with new objects. Total soil pollution, radioactive contamination, high air pollution were added to the dangerous factors. Life in the most environmentally polluted cities in the world is really dangerous and leads to massive genetic and physical diseases, mutations, short life expectancy.

How pollution is assessed

How are the world's most polluted cities ranked? Many companies are involved in assessing the most environmentally unfavorable areas for life. In particular, these are the World Health Organization (WHO), UNESCO and many others, including analytical ones. When determining the dirtiest cities in the world, several factors are taken into account:

1. Content in the environment of substances that adversely affect human health. The soil, water and air in these areas are being carefully examined.
2. radioactive contamination.
3. Proximity of the region to the source of pollution.
4. Number of living population, birth rate.
5. The impact of emissions on the development of the child's body.

The studies were carried out on a certain scale, after studying the ecology, marks were given for each of the parameters, and a list of the dirtiest cities in the world was compiled.

Rating of the most polluted cities

Which cities in the world are dangerous to live in? The number of regions unfavorable for life is steadily growing every year. If we compare the list of the most polluted cities in the world in 2016 with the most polluted cities in the world in 2017, then the increase in polluted cities was about 10%. At this pace, clean cities will soon become a real asset to the planet.

According to the WHO and the agency Curiosityaroused.com, the TOP 10 most polluted cities in the world were announced. Of course, in fact there are many more of these regions, in some individual countries it is possible to create a similar list of ten or more objects. It should be borne in mind that this list reflects the most terrible problems of mankind in terms of ecology and danger to life.

LinFyn (China)

Smog over the city of Linfeng:

This Chinese city is the cradle of coal mining for the whole country. Here is the bulk of the coal industry, both state-owned, enforcing environmental regulations, and private, operating in their own interests, often semi-illegal.

Coal mining is carried out on a large scale, so the air around the city is oversaturated with coal dust, carbon and lead. All these elements also settle on buildings, cars, people. The result of living in this city, which is dirty in every sense of the word, is diseases of the respiratory system of varying severity from complicated pneumonia to lung cancer.

Tianying (China)

The city is constantly shrouded in gray smoke, and at a distance of ten meters, even during the day, it is difficult to see something:

It is the metallurgical heart of China. But in addition to industrial giants that emit metal oxides, dust and gas into the environment, lead is also mined here. Oxides of this heavy metal affected the air, water and soil not only in the city itself, but also within a radius of ten kilometers around it. The lead content in the vegetables and cereals grown here is more than twenty times higher. This situation leads to the development of pathologically irreversible processes in the human brain, it is here that the highest birth rate of children with symptoms of dementia.

Sukinda (India)

84.75% of cases of diseases of local residents are to blame for the increased content of chromium in the body:

This Indian town, back in 2016, firmly entered the ranking of the dirtiest cities in the world thanks to chromium mines. Since the treatment facilities in this region are still only at the development stage, local waters and air contain a concentration of chromium that is fatal to humans. This chemical element is a strong carcinogen and causes gene mutations and various oncological health problems.

Dzerzhinsk (Russia)

Since the beginning of the last century, toxic waste has been dumped in the vicinity of the city, many of which are extremely dangerous for humans:

Some researchers believe that this city in the Nizhny Novgorod region should top the top 10 most polluted cities in the world. However, so far it is the dirtiest city in Russia. The situation here is almost critical: for many years, from 1938 to 1998, hazardous waste from various industries accumulated here. As a result, their number reached 300 thousand tons.

Given the number of inhabitants of this city, each has about one ton of the contents of deadly burial grounds. The level of such harmful chemicals as phenols and dioxides exceeds the maximum allowable standards by seventeen million times! Naturally, having such characteristics for life, Dzerzhinsk is an endangered region - the death rate here exceeds the birth rate by 26 times. The industry in this polluted place continues to work only thanks to visiting workers who are forced to stay in the region due to high wages.

Norilsk (Russia)

Every year, about four million tons of cadmium, copper, lead, nickel, arsenic, selenium and zinc are emitted into the Norilsk air:

Consistently hits the dirtiest cities in the world. Built about ten years ago, the treatment systems have improved the overall picture in some way. However, according to the results of the survey of the region in 2017, Norilsk still leads as the most polluted city in Russia and is among the 10 most polluted cities on our planet.

The problems of this city are in the huge emissions of the largest metallurgical plant on the planet. The atmosphere, groundwater and soil of this region contain lethal doses of such dangerous elements as lead, cadmium, arsenic, zinc, copper and others. Norilsk has long been infamous as a zone of environmental problems - there is almost no vegetation, insects do not survive, and black snow falls in winter.

Chernobyl (Ukraine)

Today, about 500 people live in the zone. Most of them are old people. Work is underway in the exclusion zone, however, for security reasons, the government allows a maximum of 14 days in the exclusion zone:

The city is world famous for the explosion at the nuclear power plant in April 1986. Radioactive elements were quickly spread by gusts of wind to nearby territories within more than one hundred and fifty thousand square kilometers. Residents of the city were hastily evacuated, and people are still not allowed to live here.

Studies by international organizations, including, according to WHO, in the affected area there are plutonium, uranium, iodine, strontium and heavy metals in concentrations unacceptable for human existence. Chernobyl, as a zone of a vast nuclear catastrophe, has been among the most polluted cities in the world since 1986.

Dhaka (Bangladesh)

The Bangladeshis themselves do not care about the environment: garbage is scattered everywhere, and industrial and medical waste is simply dumped into rivers:

The capital of Bangladesh is notorious for its environmental condition. The total pollution of water with pesticides and pathogenic bacteria makes life in this city deadly. Another important factor is the lack of waste processing enterprises. There is no fight against the problems of garbage waste storage, so mountains of garbage can be seen right on the roads and in residential areas of the city.

In fact, Dhaka is the most polluted city in the world, in terms of pollution in the literal sense. Given the warm climate of the country, waste pollution and the multiplication of microorganisms leads to increased air pollution, unsuitability of drinking water for food, infectious diseases and high mortality among the population.

Kabwe (Zambia)

Within a radius of ten kilometers from Kabwe, it is deadly to drink water and even breathe air:

In this African region, large deposits of lead were discovered about a hundred years ago. Since then, there has been active development of deposits, mines are constantly poisoning the environment, including air, groundwater and soil. The defeat of the body by heavy metal is fraught with blood poisoning, muscle atrophy and irreversible changes in the functioning of internal organs.

La Oroya (Peru)

The surroundings of the city are more like a lunar landscape with bare scorched earth, without grass, trees and bushes:

A small town, since 1922, has been regularly exposed to toxin emissions from working mines. The content of lead in the blood of local residents many times exceeds even the maximum allowable level. Vegetation in this region is regularly destroyed by acid rain, and the majority of local residents have pathologies that are incompatible with life.

Karabash (Russia)

Vegetation is almost completely absent, scorched earth, mountains of waste, orange cracked earth, acid rain. Lead, arsenic, sulfur and copper products are in the air

Which city tops the most environmentally polluted cities in the world? Today, according to the UNESCO world organization, the dirtiest city in the world is Karabash, located in the Chelyabinsk region of our vast Motherland.

The pollution of this region began as early as 1822, when reserves of gold ore were discovered here. In the twentieth century, the mining and smelting of copper was added to the development of gold veins, which made the city of Karabash a real zone of ecological disaster. The fact is that in those days, during the development of deposits, they did not particularly care about the environmental aspect of the process and there were no treatment facilities as such. During its continuous work, the plant for the production of copper alloys, simply speaking, burned out all life in the vast territories around it. Thanks to the work of this industrial giant, acid rain, dense atmospheric pollution and the almost complete absence of vegetation have become frequent guests in this area.

Needless to say, the population in this region (this includes Karabash itself and Chelyabinsk located nearby) is gradually dying out due to various deadly pathologies caused by the environment. Cancer, genetic abnormalities, mutations, dementia and cerebral palsy are the most common causes of high mortality in this region.

It's a real problem

The problem of total environmental pollution is becoming more acute every year. The number of the dirtiest cities in the world is steadily growing. Every year, not only underdeveloped cities from countries below the poverty line, but large, industrial regions get into the TOP ten dirty cities. Soil migration, air currents and cyclones spread harmful soils, air and groundwater for many kilometers, thus creating a global environmental problem for all inhabitants of planet Earth.

99% of scientists agree that the climate on Earth is changing at a tremendous rate, faster than they can analyze it. The remaining percentage of scientists are paid generous subsidies by oil and other industrial companies to cover up the shameful consequences of their activities. Carbon dioxide is just one of the many causes of global climate change. A much more serious problem is methane - it is about 17 times more toxic than carbon dioxide.

As glaciers in the oceans melt, methane is released, which has been hidden in them for millions of years in the form of frozen plants. If all of Greenland's 2.3 cubic kilometers of glaciers melted, global sea levels would rise by 7.2 meters and the 100 most populated cities in the world would be completely underwater. It is not yet known how long it will take for the world's second-largest ice sheet to melt, but the worst part is that the largest glacier - Antarctica - has already begun to melt.

In recent years, huge amounts of hazardous waste have entered the Earth's atmosphere. Industry and fuel companies destroy natural resources, cut down forests and release deadly substances into the atmosphere. There are places on Earth that, it seems, nothing will help, only time.

10. Agbogbloshi, Ghana - e-waste dump.

Most of the electronics we throw away are likely to end up in a huge, burning landfill in Ghana. There is a horrendous mercury content here, 45 times more than is allowed in the US. More than 250,000 citizens of Ghana live in dangerous conditions for health and life. This is especially true of those whose job it is to dig through this dump in search of metals to be recycled.

9. Norilsk, Russia - mines and metallurgy.

Once there were camps for enemies of the people, and now it is the second largest city beyond the Arctic Circle. The first mines appeared here in the 1930s, when no one thought about ecology. It is home to the world's largest heavy metal smelting complex, which releases about two million tons of sulfur dioxide into the atmosphere every year. Miners in Norilsk live ten years less than the world average. This is one of the most polluted places in Russia: even the snow tastes of sulfur and is black. Sulfur dioxide emissions cause diseases such as lung cancer.

8. Niger Delta, Nigeria - oil spills.

About two million barrels of oil are pumped out of this zone every day. About 240,000 barrels end up in the Niger Delta. From 1976 to 2001, about seven thousand cases of oil spills in the river were recorded here, and most of this oil was never collected. The spills heavily polluted the air, resulting in the formation of carcinogens such as polycyclic hydrocarbons. A 2013 study estimated that pollution caused by spills has a huge impact on cereal crops, leading to a 24% increase in digestive disorders in children. Other consequences of the oil spill also include cancer and infertility.

7. Matanza Riachuelo, Argentina - industrial pollution.

Some 15,000 companies are dumping toxic waste directly into the Matanza Riachuelo River, which flows through Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina. The people who live there have almost no sources of clean drinking water. There is a high level of diseases associated with diarrhea, oncology and respiratory diseases, which reaches 60% among the 20 thousand people living on the banks of the river.

6. Hazaribagh, Bangladesh - leather production.

About 95% of the registered tanneries in Bangladesh are located in Hazaribagh, a district in the capital Dhaka. Here, outdated and banned in other countries methods of leather dressing are used, not to mention the fact that all these industries emit about 22 thousand cubic liters of toxic chemicals into the largest river. The hexavalent chromium found in this waste causes cancer. Residents have to put up with high levels of respiratory and skin diseases, as well as acid burns, nausea, dizziness and itching.

5. Valley of the river Chitarum, Indonesia - industrial and domestic pollution.

The level of mercury in the river is more than a thousand times higher than the standards of the US Environmental Protection Agency. Additional research has revealed extremely high levels of toxic metals, including manganese, iron and aluminum. Indonesia's capital, Jakarta, is a city of 10 million people. The valley of the Chitarum River is covered with a large amount of various toxic waste - industrial and domestic, which is dumped directly into the waters of the river. Fortunately, the country's authorities have taken the initiative to clean up the river, which will be funded by a $500 million loan from the Asian Development Bank.

4. Dzerzhinsk, Russia - chemical production.

300,000 tons of hazardous chemical waste was dumped in and around the city from 1930 to 1998. In 2007, Dzerzhinsk entered the Guinness Book of Records as the most poisonous city on the planet. In water samples, levels of phenols and dioxins were found, thousands of times higher than the norm. These substances are directly linked to cancer and diseases leading to disability. In 2006, the average life expectancy for women here was 47 years, and for men - 42 years, with a population of 245 thousand people.

3. Chernobyl, Ukraine - an accident at a nuclear power plant.

The accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant holds the title of the worst nuclear disaster in history. The release of radiation as a result of the accident was about a hundred times greater than as a result of the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The outskirts of the city have been empty for over 20 years. It is believed that about 4 thousand cases of thyroid cancer, as well as mutations in newborns, are caused by the consequences of the disaster.

2. "Fukushima Daiichi", Japan - an accident at a nuclear power plant.

After a strong earthquake, a 15-meter tsunami covered the cooling units and the power supply of the three Fukushima reactors, which led to a nuclear accident on March 11, 2011. More than 280,000 tons of water with chemical waste are now being held at the power plant, and about 100,000 tons of water are believed to be in the basements of four reactors in the turbine shops. Rescue workers tried to send robots there, but they melted when they got too close. People in this area are at risk for a wide variety of cancers. According to the World Health Organization, this is the most polluted place in the world. Here, there is a 70% higher risk of getting thyroid cancer among girls who were exposed as children, a 7% higher risk of thyroid cancer among boys, and a 6% higher risk of breast cancer in women.

1. Lake Karachay, Russia.

It is believed that Lake Karachay is the dirtiest place on Earth. It is located next to the Mayak production association, which produces nuclear weapons components, isotopes, and is engaged in the storage and regeneration of spent nuclear fuel. This is the largest and one of the least efficient such industries in Russia. It has been throwing waste into the river that flows into Lake Karachay since the 1950s. The place was kept secret until the mid-1990s. There have been several nuclear accidents at the factory, and toxic waste has entered the lake. Before the authorities acknowledged these facts, among the population of the Chelyabinsk region, the number of cases of leukemia increased by 40%, by 25% - by birth defects and by 20% - by cancer. Enough exposure for one hour at the lake to die.