Due to dangerously high levels of smog, officials in Lahore, Punjab, announced on Friday that schoolchildren would not be allowed to exercise outside until January.
This week, the eastern megacity close to the Indian border recorded more than 20 times the level of pollution that the World Health Organization (WHO) considers safe, making it one of the most polluted cities in the world.
Due to low-grade fuel from factories and automobiles in the low-lying 14 million-person metropolis, where emissions are trapped at ground level by heavier cold air, smog is especially acute in the winter.
Another significant contributing element is farmers’ seasonal crop burn-off on the outskirts of Lahore.
The eastern Punjab province’s Environmental Protection Agency announced last week that outdoor school activities in Lahore would cease on Monday.
