I visited China from 7/6/17 to 7/18/17. It was a fantastic experience, and I highly recommend seeing the country. The people, food, sites, and culture are incredible. I felt safe the entire trip. It was one of my favorite experiences ever.
The very first thing my family and I experienced, even while still inside the airport, was the smog. It was very unfamiliar to us, notwithstanding that we live in Los Angeles and are not foreign to air pollution. The air was brown, hot, humid, and definitely impacted our breathing. Our eyes were immediately irritated. It is no exaggeration to say that smoke billowed from smoke stacks all around Beijing. This was likewise the case in Shanghai and Chongqing. The air was better in less urban areas such as Chengdu, Xian, and the Yangtze River, however, it wasn’t great.
I couldn’t help but consider the terrible health consequences of being exposed to the polluted air. I was only there for approximately two weeks. Many locals wore masks. In my mind I equated the air to a person smoking. While perhaps not as concentrated as cigarette smoke, the Chinese people breath in their polluted air 24/7. The health impact of this intrigued me. I had long considered what impact the environment had on myself when diagnosed with Leukemia. I found myself wondering on a more global scale what health impacts the environment (via pollution) was having on the Chinese people.
Environmental Science and Its Application to Health 