〈 signed 〉 to protect the respiratory safety of students-schools at all levels below the central and southern high school vocational schools were equipped with anti-haze equipment, and outdoor classes were immediately suspended when the hourly value of PM

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For the purpose of protecting the respiratory safety of students, we propose on the public policy network participation platform to "protect the respiratory safety of students-install anti-haze equipment in high and secondary vocational schools in central and southern China, and immediately suspend outdoor classes when the hourly value of PM2.5 exceeds 54 micrograms." if more than 5000 secondments can be assembled within 60 days (between February 2 and April 3). The authorities (the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Health and Welfare, and the Environmental Protection Department of the Executive Yuan) must respond to all the demands in the proposal.

Please go to the Joint signature page (https://join.gov.tw/idea/detail/989005a8-6ff1-4c89-a7ac-5bff229816ef) and click on the side to support "before the air quality is lower than the recommended value of WHO, the government should increase the relevant equipment and supporting measures" and the three major demands put forward by this Council!

Proposed content or proposal

Apart from asking government departments to improve air quality as soon as possible, to really reduce air pollution, and to put forward specific coal reduction plans, the Taichung Branch of the Housewives' Union Environmental Protection Foundation should also improve children's health and learning environment at the same time! For this reason, we advocate that before the air quality is lower than the recommended value of WHO (PM2.5 annual average 10 μ g / m ³, daily average 25 μ g / m ³), the government should increase measures and supporting measures to ensure the respiratory safety of school children, and put forward three major demands:

1. Clearly implement "outdoor classes will be stopped immediately if the hourly concentration of PM2.5 exceeds 54 μ g."

The EPA changed the air quality index from PSI to AQI,AQI on December 1, 2016. in fact, there is a serious delay. PM2.5, PM10 and ozone are calculated on the basis of the moving average of the last 12 or 8 hours, which does not reflect the current deterioration of empty products, but presents the historical air quality of the past. And more than 150ug PM2.5 is purple, the purple flag that used to appear on campus will no longer be seen, even if the PM2.5 is only a red flag, the red flag has become the worst grade of virtually empty goods!

We believe that it should be mainly based on the nearest air quality station and the PM2.5 micro-detector in the school. The above detection basis can reflect the current hourly monitoring values. When the hourly concentration of PM2.5 exceeds 54 μ g (air quality grade, 54 μ g is red alert) or air quality index, the school should immediately stop all kinds of outdoor activities, including physical education, sports meeting, garden party, etc. In order to maintain the health of students, avoid exposure to high concentrations of harmful air and cause short -, medium-and long-term health effects. The government and schools should recognize the impact of air pollution on people's health and establish a sound supervision mechanism to protect the health of students based on the principle of prevention.

2. Subsidize schools in air pollution hardest-hit areas in central and southern Taiwan (counties and cities south of Taichung) with air pollution funds or other budgets, install miniature monitoring machines such as air boxes indoors and outdoors, and strengthen the monitoring of PM2.5 real-time air quality. The installation of anti-haze screen windows, the installation of air cleaning machines or the construction of additional air film gymnasiums and other anti-haze equipment, so that indoor air quality is also guaranteed.

3. Amend Article 18 of the Air pollution Prevention and Control Law and the measures for the maintenance and Application of the income and Expenditure of the Air pollution Prevention Fund, and add a clear legal source that can be used to purchase haze prevention and cleaning equipment in schools, so that all counties and cities can use this resource funds to improve indoor empty products in teaching places.

Benefit and influence

The "Air Hazard (Danger in the air)" investigation report released by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in December 2017 clearly pointed out that air pollution will be a deadly killer threatening the health of children in this century. It is obvious that it is important to protect the respiratory health of students.

If this proposal is passed, one of the benefits of Taiwan will be about 1513818 senior high school students and kindergarten children from nine counties and cities in Taichung, Nantou, Changhua, Yunlin, Chiayi, Tainan, Kaohsiung and Pingtung. Accounting for about 49% of Taiwan's school-age population (based on the number of county and city students downloaded by the Census and Statistics Department in 107-2-1), it is definitely the most forward-looking plan for 2018.

Second, the air pollution control fund (motorcycle license tax) that the government wants to collect from the public will be used cost-effectively, rather than just subsidizing factories to replace boilers, constantly exploiting people's health.

Effects of air pollution on health

Air pollution and fine suspended particulates (PM2.5) are invisible killers of health, while developing children and adolescents are much more affected than adults. Domestic and foreign studies show that:

The National Institutes of Health, the Department of National Health of the Ministry of Health and the Environmental Protection Agency of the Executive Yuan have jointly implemented a three-year program entitled "effects of fine suspended particulates (PM2.5) on public health" since 2015. The results of lung function tests of 1000 children were tracked. Compared with the local PM2.5 concentration, it was found that for every 6 micrograms per cubic meter of exposure, the lung function of children decreased by 2%, affecting lung development and possibly increasing mortality.

Nicholas Rees, a policy expert of the United Nations Children's Fund, pointed out that the critical period of brain development of infants and young children is about one thousand days after birth, and the PM2.5 in the air is too small to be excreted by the human body, so once it enters the child's body, it will invade the cerebral vascular wall, cause cerebral neuritis, hinder the child's neural development, and lead to a serious deficiency in oral expression, IQ and memory in the future. Learning ability and potential are even more difficult to develop.

In December 2017, a new British study in the prestigious international medical journal Lancet found that walking slowly in streets with air pollution (PM2.5 concentration of 17 micrograms per cubic meter) is not only bad for the heart and lungs, but may also be harmful.

A study in the well-known medical journal BMC Pulmonary Medicine found that asthma attacks and pneumonia in children living on busy roads increased by 80%, while healthy children also increased the incidence of respiratory diseases because of air pollution.

Guo Yuliang, director of the National Institute of Environmental Medicine of the National Institutes of Health, said that the higher the exposure to PM2.5, the greater the health effects. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that the average annual concentration of PM2.5 should be less than 10 micrograms per cubic meter. The research team estimated the annual average PM2.5 concentration in various townships and towns in 2016 and found that PM2.5 concentrations were higher than 24 micrograms per cubic meter in most areas south of Taichung and even higher than 30 micrograms per cubic meter in some areas of Gaoping, indicating that PM2.5 pollution in the central and southern regions is in urgent need of control. Therefore, when the air quality is bad in the central and southern regions, outdoor classes should be changed to indoor.

Indoor air quality is also the focus of our attention. Taiwan is the second country in the world to regulate indoor air quality, but after the indoor air products law was put on the road in 101, indoor air products in classrooms have not been valued and implemented. The bodies of children and adolescents are growing, and the ratio of breathing to body weight is 50% higher than that of adults. At present, because of outdoor air pollution, school children spend less time on outdoor activities. They already spend more than 80% of their time indoors. The air pollution season coincides with autumn and winter, making the situation even worse. Moreover, children are more vulnerable to indoor air pollution than adults. According to the WHO research report, there are 100000 people worldwide who die of asthma as a result of indoor air pollution every year, 35% of whom are children.

We believe that both of them need to be addressed squarely, whether it is to reduce the number of outdoor pollution sources or to strengthen the improvement of indoor air quality in order to effectively protect the health and safety of students.

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