3  World’s most contaminated capital cities and quarantined by COVID-19
One of the most important guidelines carried out by the WHO in matters of air quality is not to exceed 10 μg/m3 of annual average concentration or 25 μg/m3 of 24-h concentrations, for that reason Meteosim (2019), presents the cities that exceed 10 μg/m3 of annual average in the year 2018. Table 1 shows the start of the quarantine or the alarm status of the world’s most polluted capitals. As shown in the table, firstly Delhi (India) is the capital most polluted by fine particulate matter, reaching an annual average of 113,5 μg/m3 for 2018, secondly Dhaka (Bangladesh) with 97,1 μg/m3. Lisbon and Berlin are least polluted capitals, presenting an annual average of 11,7 μg/m3 for 2018. Regarding the aforementioned ranking, each capital was taken and the lockdown date was sought due to the effect of COVID-19. 12% of the capitals do not apply any lockdown. The first countries to start blocking mobility to colleges, universities and apply telework were: Mongolia and China. In March 9th lockdowns began to be applied in the other countries. Not all countries carried out a lockdown, there were some exceptions such as Kazakhstan (Astana), where a state of emergency is declared on March 15th, as well as in Romania on 24 March and Indonesia on April 2. On the other hand, other countries took partial or more drastic lockdown measures, for example, in Slovakia (Bratislava) it is allowed to walk or exercise outdoors with the mask protect. Mexico City, declared a voluntary quarantine and Bangkok (Thailand) and Belgrade (Serbia), have declared a curfew since April 4.
Table 1 Location-start to quarantine (Meteosim, 2019).
Country Location (Capital cities) PM2.5 μg/m3 (Annual) Date (Quarantine) Studies
India Delhi 113,5 25/03/20 Soler (2020)
Bangladesh Dhaka 97,1 16/03/20 Global Voices (2020)
Afghanistan Kabul 61,8 28/03/20 Europapress (2020a)
Bahrain (Barein) Manama 59,8 ∗
Mongolia Ulaanbaatar 58,5 25/01/20 Anandsaikhan (2020)
Kuwait Kubait City 56 9/03/20 Europapress (2020b)
Nepal Kathmandu 54,4 24/03/20 The Jakarta Post (2020)
China Bejing 50,9 29/01/20 BBC News Mundo (2020)
UAE Abu Dhabi 48,8 ∗
Indonesia Jakarta 45,3 2/04/20 The Jakarta Post (2020)
Uganda Kampala 40,8 1/04/20 Museveni (2020)
Vietnam Hanoi 40,8 19/03/20 TheStraitsTimes (2020)
Pakistan Islammabad 38,6 ∗
Bosnia & Hersegovina sarajevo, 38,4 17/03/20 La Vanguardia (2020a)
Uzbekistan Tashkent 34,3 24/03/20 Pikulicka (2020)
Macedonia del norte Skopje 34 10/04/20 BalkanInsight (2020)
Sri Lanka Colombo 32 12/03/20 Europapress (2020c)
Kosovo Pristina 30,4 11/04/20 Gazetaexpress (2020)
Kazahstan Astana 29,8 15/03/20 Gussarova (2020)
Chile Santiago 29,4 26/03/20 Perfil (2020)
Bulgaria Sofia 28,2 20/03/20 La Vanguardia (2020b)
Peru Lima 28 19/03/20 (AS Peru, 2020)
Iran Tehran 26,1 25/03/20 CNN Mundo (2020)
Thailand Bangkok 25,2 4/04/20 La Vanguardia (2020c)
Poland Warsaw 24,2 13/03/20 Solis (2020)
Serbia Belgrade 23,9 10/04/20 BalkanInsight (2020)
South Korea Seoul 23,3 ∗
Romania Bucharest 20,3 24/03/20 (La vanguardia, 2020)
Cambodia PhnomPenh 20,1 ∗
Mexico Mexico city 19,7 23/03/20 Mancilla (2020)
Turkey Ankara 19,6 4/04/20 GardaWorld (2020)
Isarel Tel Aviv 19,5 19/03/20 Itón Gadol (2020)
Lithuania Vilnius 18,2 14/03/20 Europapress (2020d)
Nicosia Cyprus 17,4 21/03/20 (GOV.UK, 2020)
Czech Republic Prague 17,4 16/03/20 Sociedad Agencia EFE (2020)
Slovakia Bratislavia 17,2 16/03/20 Tort (2020)
Hungary Budapest 16,5 27/03/20 Dunai (2020)
France Paris 15,6 17/03/20 Solis (2020)
Austria Vienna 15,2 15/03/20 DW (2020)
Taiwan Taipei 14,9 ∗
Singapore Singapore 14,8 8/04/20 Naurana (2020)
Philippines Manila 14,3 17/03/20 (Europapress, 2020e)
Belgium Brussels 14,1 18/03/20 Theguardian (2020)
Colombia Bogota 13,9 25/03/20 (Eltiempo.comEltiempo.com, 2020)
Ukraine Kyiv 13,8 17/03/20 (Kyivpost.comKyivpost.com, 2020)
Japan Tokyo 13,1 25/03/20 (Japantimes.comJapantimes.com, 2020)
Switzerland Bern 12,8 16/03/20 (Swissinfo.ch, 2020)
United Kingdom London 12 23/03/20 (nbcnews.comnbcnews.com, 2020)
Germany Berlin 11,7 13/03/20 (Lanacion.com, 2020)
Portugal Lisbon 11,7 20/03/20 Sampson (2020)
∗No quarantine.