The negative effects on human health, along with the fatalities caused by the new coronavirus, have led governments worldwide to take strict measures. However, a reduction in air pollution has been found in many regions on a global scale. This study is focused on how the COVID-19 pandemic is impacting on the air quality in Ecuador, one of the most alarming cases of COVID-19 contagion in Latin America, occupying the first place as regards deaths per capita. The spatio-temporal variations in NO₂ concentrations in 12 highly populated cities were evaluated by comparing the NO₂ tropospheric concentrations before (2019) and after (2020) the COVID-19 lockdown. The atmospheric data was collected from the TROPOMI on the Sentinel-5P satellite of the European Space Agency. A reduction in NO₂ concentrations (−13%) was observed as a consequence of the COVID-19 lockdown in Ecuador. However, this reduction occurred to the greatest extent in the cases of Guayaquil (−23.4%) and Quito (−22.4%), the two most highly populated cities. Linking NO₂ levels to confirmed cases/deaths of COVID-19, a strong correlation between air NO₂ concentrations and the cases/mortality caused by coronavirus (r = 0.91; p<0.001) was observed. This work highlights the crucial role played by air quality as regards human health.

新型冠状病毒对人类健康的负面影响以及造成的死亡，已促使世界各国政府采取严格措施。然而，全球许多地区的空气污染有所减少。这项研究的重点是 COVID-19 大流行如何影响厄瓜多尔的空气质量，厄瓜多尔是拉丁美洲最令人震惊的 COVID-19 感染病例之一，在人均死亡人数方面占据首位。通过比较 COVID-19 封锁之前（2019 年）和之后（2020 年）的 NO _{2 对流层浓度，评估了 12 个人口稠密城市的 NO 2浓度}时空变化。大气数据是从欧洲航天局 Sentinel-5P 卫星上的 TROPOMI 收集的。由于厄瓜多尔实施了 COVID-19 封锁，NO ₂浓度下降了 (-13%)。然而，这种下降幅度最大的是瓜亚基尔（-23.4%）和基多（-22.4%）这两个人口最多的城市。将 NO ₂水平与确诊的 COVID-19 病例/死亡联系起来，观察到空气中 NO ₂浓度与冠状病毒引起的病例/死亡率之间存在很强的相关性（ r = 0.91；p<0.001）。这项工作强调了空气质量对人类健康所发挥的关键作用。