So, where is the least healthy city in the world? According to Mercer Human Resource Consulting, "The lowest-ranking city for health and sanitation is Baku in Azerbaijan, which scores just 27.6. Other low-scoring cities include Dhaka in Bangladesh, Antananarivo in Madagascar and Port Au Prince in Haiti, which score 29.6, 30.1 and 34 respectively."
Mercer takes into consideration the following indicators:
- Hospital Services;
- Medical Supplies;
- Infectious Diseases;
- Water Potability;
- Troublesome and destructive animals/insects;
- Waste Removal;
- Sewage and Air Pollution.
Furthermore, their methodology is not publicly available. While Baku may have health problems, it is hard to imagine that it deserves a score lower than Port-au-Prince or Dhaka (of course no offense to these cities intended).
We'd love to hear your opinion and other data for or against Mercer's results. Please post a comment.
2 comments:
Baku certainly ranks among the world's worst cases of soil contamination, which makes its groundwater toxic (http://www.caspianenvironment.org/eracl/unido_4.htm). The Caspian is an oil sump. (http://www.ce-review.org/01/3/smailes3.html) Sumgait was a gigantic chem lab with no safety equipment, and has a children's cemetery to show for it (http://www.bootsnall.com/articles/06-08/the-baby-cemetery-sumgait-azerbaijan.html).
Expats in P-a-P and Dhaka can insulate themselves from poor sanitation, but it's a lot harder to avoid a comprehensive environmental catastrophe.
That said, Baku's ozone and particulates levels aren't anywhere near the world's worst, and I'd expect that a year in Mexico City, or Beijing, or Teheran is a lot likelier to make an expat sick than a year in Baku.
Dear Genews,
Thanks for the comment. Very interesting articles as well.
I think you make a good point.
How you judge health depends on which factors are more important and how they are ranked.
Air quality v. water quality -- for example.
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