Growing up in a polluted environment does not improve oneâs ability to resist the health effects and diseases of pollution. In fact, according to water and health researcher Sharon Kleyne, the exact opposite is true. People who grow up in a clean environment have the highest pollution resistance.
Sharon Kleyne is Founder of Bio-Logic Aqua Research, a water and health research and development center, and host of the globally syndicated Sharon Kleyne Hour Power of Water® radio show on Voice American and Apple iTunes.
According to Kleyne, the differences among various groups in pollution disease resistance are most dramatic in China, which in a few decades has gone from being largely unpolluted to one of the worldâs most polluted countries.
Kleyne recently interviewed two China born doctors on this subject, Shanhong Lu, MD, and Effie Chow, PhD. Both combine traditional Chinese medicine with modern Western medicine. Dr. Lu is author of Vibrant Life: Restoring the Roots of Health (2013). Dr. Chow is Founder of the East-West Academy of Healing Arts and served on the White House Advisory Committee on Alternative Medicine.
Dr. Lu described a visit to her father in China several years ago, during which the extreme air pollution made her ill. In fact, said Lu, lung disease and eye infections, are widespread in Chinaâs most polluted industrial areas. Dr. Lu noted that like her father, many older individuals, who grew up before China became âWesternizedâ and polluted, appear far better able to resist and tolerate pollution than younger people. Her father, in fact, suffered no pollution caused health effects whatsoever.
Dr. Chow observed that as Chinaâs pollution levels increase and the Western diet and lifestyle becomes more prevalent (there are now over 100 McDonaldâs in Beijing), younger Chinese are not only exposed to more pollution earlier, they are also moving away from the traditional Chinese healing arts that have been practiced for thousands of years.
Chinese medicine emphasizes long-term wellness, spiritual balance, breathing, meditation, water and hydration, diet, and the bodyâs natural ability to heal itself. The objective, according to Dr. Chow, is to prevent disease by building natural immunity and resistance. Those who have abandoned this lifestyle have a diminished ability to defend against diseases caused by air pollution, and against many other âWestern diseasesâ (such as heart disease and cancer).
Kleyne draws a comparison between someone who grows up in clean air and then moves to a polluted area, versus someone who grows up in a polluted area and stays there. Very simply, the person who grows up in pollution is more likely to be sickly from the start and will therefore have less resistance than the clean air person. The same is true of good diets versus poor diets. . .
As founder of Bio-Logic Aqua® Research, Sharon Kleyne, has been researching water and health for three decades. Bio-Logic Aqua Research bottles the product Natureâs Tears® EyeMist®. Mrs. Kleyne has hosted the Sharon Kleyne Hour Power of Water since 2007. Kleyneâs interviews with Drs. Shanhong Lu and Effie Chow may be heard in podcast on Voice Americaâs Variety or Health and Wellness Channels, and on http://www.sharonkleynehour.com and Apple iTunes radio.
