This past year and a half has been a stressful one, so when we received the list of the world’s most and least stressful cities, the ball was in anyone’s hands.
Stress, as we know, can be brought on by a range of factors, so when the Least and Most Stressful Cities Index 2021 created their ranking, they focused on a few really impactful issues, including covering governance and finance as well as environmental factors like pollution and traffic. It then ranked and compared a number of global locations against a wide range of stress-causing indicators in these categories. Finally, a Covid Response Stress Impact score was calculated by analysing how stressful the pandemic response of each government has been for its citizens in addition to its effectiveness (Hint: Tokyo got some brownie points here).
“To begin the study, VAAY considered which macro factors contribute to stress, narrowing them down to four broad categories. Next, over 500 global cities were assessed against a number of stress indicators in these categories, before those without reliable data were removed, leaving a final line-up of 100 cities,” a press release explains.
According to the report, coming int number one as the least stressful city in the world is Reykjavik, Iceland, ahead of Bern, Switzerland and Helsinki, Finland. Mumbai, India, ranks as the most stressful city in the study, followed by Lagos, Nigeria and Manila, the Philippines.
People living in Reykjavik, Iceland have the best air quality, followed by Edinburgh, United Kingdom and Wellington, New Zealand. The worst air quality was found to be in New Delhi, India, followed by Riyadh, Saudi Arabia and Karachi, Pakistan.
Citizens in Oslo, Norway have the best access to healthcare, ahead of Sydney, Australia and Tokyo, Japan.
Check out the top 10 in each category below.
