Abstract
Environmental pollution is the most important public health problem densely in populated areas in the developing countries and often the underlying cause of many diseases of public health importance. Noise pollution is an undesirable sound that interferes with wellbeing in the environment with significant effects. With the current rapid growth and technological advancement, noise pollution is increasingly becoming environmental menace that deserves appropriate attention in order to mitigate its health effects. This paper aims to determine the sources, awareness and health effects of noise pollution in a typical Nigerian sub-urban population. Descriptive cross-sectional study using interviewer administered questionnaire and measurement of environmental noise using acoustic metre. Majority of the respondents (75.8%) were exposed to noise levels above the 55dB WHO safe noise level without health effects. Power generators, automobiles and grinding machines are the commonest sources of noise pollution in the studied environment amounted to a value of 55.8%, 40% and 35.8% respectively and to a lesser extent hawker (16.4%) and loudspeaker (9.6%) among others. Sleep disturbance, headache, and poor concentration were commonly reported effects of noise in the environment with magnitudes of 52.7%, 50.9%, 15.8% respectively. Anxiety (12.1%) and hearing disturbances (11.5%) were also common. Noise pollution associated health problems are common in the community with significant effects on the quality of life of the inhabitants. Stable power supply, effective legislation and improvement in living condition of the people are key to minimize noise pollution and avert its deleterious health effects.
Highlights
Environment has a critical role in human health as many diseases can be traced to adverse environmental factors (Miner et al, 2005).Environmental pollution is one of the major causes of deteriorating living conditions for the inhabitants of densely populated areas (Buadee, Gawu and Foli, 2018)
Noise which usually does not lead to physical injury constitutes an important yet largely underscored source of environmental pollution
Exposure to noise pollution is associated with a lot of health consequences which are directly related to the duration of exposure and the intensity of the noise exposed to
Summary
Environment has a critical role in human health as many diseases can be traced to adverse environmental factors (Miner et al, 2005).Environmental pollution is one of the major causes of deteriorating living conditions for the inhabitants of densely populated areas (Buadee, Gawu and Foli, 2018). It can be defined “as the introduction by man into the environment of substances or energy liable to cause hazards to human health, harm to living resources and ecological systems; damage to structure or amenity or interference with legitimate uses of the environment” (Reddy, 2017; El-sharkawy and Alsubaie, 2014). Very high levels of noise are associated with enhanced risk of pathological changes such as hypertension, increased levels of heart beat rate, headaches, irritability, nervousness, feeling
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