I am going to assume that in urban vs rural areas that is a similar effect from air pollution.
But all my doctors have been inclined to give me pills for depression, and aren't interesting in exploring the relationship with O2.
Elite, and dedicated amateur, athletes will develop specific breathing routines to increase O2 availability in support of increasing their VO2 Max but even for sedentary (so, typical) adults practically any form of mindful breathing coupled with higher-than-typical physical exertion will increase oxygen availability.
Their breathing routines not coincidentally almost always mirror some kind of yogic breathing technique.
Yogic breathing in hypobaric environment: breathing exercising and its effect on hypobaric hypoxemia and heart rate at 3,650-m elevation
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8413908/
Effects of Slow Deep Breathing at High Altitude on Oxygen Saturation, Pulmonary and Systemic Hemodynamics
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3495772/
When you meditate or do yoga asanas (poses) with a focus on your pranayama (breathing) as a matter of routine for long enough you subconsciously start performing yogic breathing all of the time.
Walking is just irrefutably, no-citation-needed, good for you.
I would make these claims instead:
- people at altitude spend more time indoors avoiding extreme weather caused by the altitude
- o2 levels to the brain are not significantly different for people whose bodies have adjusted to the altitude already
- people who live at altitude are more likely to be more active
- cities in modern western countries are largely clean of major sources of air pollution (one of the few things NIMBYs are good at)
- cities in developing countries (eg. Pakistan, India, China) are incredibly different
- rural areas are largely clean of air pollution except in hotspots (eg. factories and mines)
- your doctor likely doesn’t do actual science (“explore relationships”), but rather just disseminates the evidence that others have already recorded
- your doctor likely works in the USA where we pay fee for service. Maybe you should look at how single payer systems align healthy patient long term outcomes align with the single payer total costs.Source, in dutch: https://www.hln.be/milieu/omwonenden-a10-snelweg-leven-79-da...
Or when we build the highway, we don’t raze the homes of the elite/wealthy/well-connected to do it, we do it in “bad neighbourhoods”
Or indirect effects: factories move/build next to the new highway (ease of moving materials+density of employees+ease of commuting because of the highway), contaminating the neighbourhood.
And that's excluding the light and noise pollution that are inevitable in urban areas. Yeah, living in a rural area is pure hell.