Poor air quality. Low quality water. Too few parks. ‘Welcome’ to Bucharest, one of the unhealthiest capitals in Europe, according to the Healthiest Capital City report.
The report which was compiled by British-based online healthcare services provider Treated.com based its results on data collected from Numbeo, HPI ThinkTank, World Population Review, World Bank Group and Index Mundi.
Bucharest takes the 44th place in the 46-city survey. Only Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, and Moscow are lower. Other cities, such are Chisinau, Skopje, Belgrade, and Sarajevo and Pristina are ahead of the Romanian capital.
At the other end of the scale, there’s Copenhagen, the capital of Denmark which is ranked Europe’s healthiest city, followed by Vienna, Bern, in Switzerland, Helsinki, the capital of Finland, and then Berlin.
The survey said it collected data for 10 health-related variables and then ranked the cities.
The variables were: fitness club, monthly fee for one adult; life expectancy; air quality; water quality; overall quality of life; percent of GDP allocated to healthcare; cost of 5 fruit or vegetables; CO2 emissions; walk or cycle to work and the quality of green spaces.
“Not only are these variables representative of our physical well-being, but they also relate to our psychological health, ” said Clinical Lead at Treated.com, Dr Daniel Atkinson. “The quality of green spaces is a prime example of this. People need decent green spaces in their cities because they’re oxygen rich, of benefit to the respiratory system and can be prime locations to exercise freely. „
The results are in line with similar studies which conclude that Nordic countries and cities are among the happiest, greenest and safest places to live in Europe.
https://www.treated.com/blog/europes-healthiest-capital-city
