Egypt legally classifies noise as a pollutant

by Daniel Fink, MD, Chair, The Quiet Coalition

Photo credit: Taha Abbas

The Egyptian edition of the EnterpriseAM website explains why noise is legally classified as a pollutant in Egypt. As the current government expands its noise monitoring system, noise is considered a proxy for inefficiency and also a way to track carbon emissions.

“A loud street is almost always a high-emission street, a loud factory is almost always an energy-wasting factory, and a loud city is a city where health care costs are rising and productivity is falling,” according to the story.

Tracking noise allows government officials to know where the problems are. Years of productive life lost is a measure of the effects of noise on people. A noisy machine in a factory is inefficient for both energy use and workers, and is an overall drain on the economy.

Egypt is classified as a developing country. If a developing nation knows that noise is a problem, why doesn’t the wealthiest and most powerful country in the world understand this?

The United States actually did understand this, but the Environmental Protection Agency’s Office of Noise Abatement and Control, tasked with reducing noise exposure, was defunded in the Reagan Era. Quiet Communities, Inc., the parent organization of The Quiet Coalition, has sued the EPA to try to force it to fund congressionally-mandated noise control activities.

We hope the lawsuit is successful. A quieter world will be a better and healthier world for all.