I haven't been to Lahore in this weather but was in Multan in smog once. It looks like fog but you can tell its not. Fog is light, while smog feels thicker/denser and it's more spread out than fog. But it's still as uniform as fog itself. For lots of people it irritates their eyes, I didn't have that problem but do remember inhaling did not feel exactly like fog.
HN title should contain (2020).<p>TL;DR: nobody denies that the air in Lahore is bad, but there is controversy about who gets to measure it, and how that information is disseminated.<p>In particular, the author seems to be criticizing AirVisual for offering data and recommendations in a way that's 1) not properly contextualized (i.e. telling people they could breathe cleaner air without addressing that buying an air purifier is out of economic reach for many), and 2) tainted by commercial interest (they sell monitoring devices for what the average resident of Lahore would surely consider an exorbitant sum)<p>I understand those criticisms, but... is that really the most salient point to make about this whole situation?<p>Spend five minutes looking into it, and it's completely fucking obvious that the air is terrible and it will take years off your life. Perhaps attention should be diverted away from the question of how to do measurement perfectly, to the question of how to not kill tens of thousands more people this season.
Do farmers in West Punjab burn excess fasl (I don't know the english word) as well?<p>In East Punjab, because rotovators are expensive and the government subsidizes incentivize quick sowing cycles, farmers will burn fasl to kick off the Kharif sowing season.<p>I'd assume a decent amount of Lahore's air pollution is due to that pattern in Majha and Malwa.