Chinese doctors blame high levels of air pollution, the toxic byproduct of the country’s supercharged economy, for a young girl contracting a deadly disease usually confined to the elderly.
China’s rapid transformation seemingly overnight from a reclusive Maoist outpost to a modern economic powerhouse has not come without a high social price, as urban dwellers struggle to cope with choking smog and deteriorating health conditions.
The depth of the problem hit home on Monday when it was reported that an eight-year-old Chinese girl, from the eastern province of Jiangsu, became the country’s youngest person to contract lung cancer.