Noise Pollution and Impact on Children Health

Abstract

With rapid urbanization and life style changes, loud noise is omnipresent and has become a part of life. Indoor and outdoor environmental noise pollution have been documented as a serious health hazard with increasing adverse effects on fetus, infants, children, adolescents and adults. Noise induced hearing loss and non-auditory adverse effects due to noise pollution, are being increasingly diagnosed in all age groups including the fetus. Outdated motorized vehicles, machinery, increasing traffic, congested residential areas, crowded educational institutions and workplaces, unregulated commercial and industrial noise have become a source of noise pollution with long-term disability. Areas of noise pollution must be identified and corrective measures be taken. Toys, personal, domestic, commercial, industrial equipment should be within the safe sound intensity. Loudspeakers and vehicular horns should be banned except in emergencies. Nocturnal noise pollution must be avoided near residential areas as sleep disturbances have serious long-term health consequences. Pregnant women, fetus, newborns, infants and children are most susceptible to noise induced health hazards and should be given utmost protection. Educational institutions, workplaces, commercial and industrial areas should be regularly monitored for noise levels and protective ear muffs and plugs be used. Public be educated repeatedly regarding health hazards of noise. Traffic noise should be regulated to be within safe limits. Bus-stands, railway stations and airports should be moved away from residential areas. Houses should be sound proofed suitably. Long term studies should be conducted in pregnant women, newborn children and adults to have more data on hazards of noise pollution.

Indoor air quality prediction systems for smart environments: A systematic review

“…Finally, one study each was included from other countries as mentioned in Table 2. However, no study from other developing countries such as India, Nepal and Bangladesh that are greatly affected by IAP due to inadequate ventilation arrangements were included [13,42,48,53,83,100]. As the majority of the population in these countries use biomass fuels for cooking and heating purpose, the researchers in these locations need to show an active participation in the development of some potential IAQ monitoring and prediction systems that can provide more accurate results based on specific geographic conditions and pollutant concentrations [61,85,138].…”

Progressive Dominant Hearing Loss (Autosomal Dominant Deafness‐41) and P2RX2 Gene Mutations: A Phenotype–Genotype Study

“…Sensorineural hearing loss remains the most common type of hearing loss. In adults, two of the main contributing factors to this hearing loss are age (presbycusis) and noise exposure . NIHL is a leading cause of sensory disability, despite the accelerating awareness of the hazards of sustained exposure to high‐level environmental and recreational sound in society.…”

Vehicular Noise Pollution: Its Environmental Implications and Strategic Control

“…School and college bus-stands should be away from the school and colleges. Educational institutions should not be established near the railway tracks, stations and airports [140][141][142].…”