There are serious life-shortening consequences of breathing polluted air

by Dr Karine Nohr

A British landmark study of over 3,400 London children aged between 6 and 9 years old measured the impact of air quality improvement following the introduction of London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) and found that reduced emissions are strongly associated with accelerated lung growth in children. Just published by one of the global leading medical journals, the ‘Lancet Public Health’ , the ‘CHILL’ study is one that all of us, everywhere, need to understand.

The study measured the health of children’s lungs living in areas that would subsequently become low-emission traffic zones and then re-measured annually for 5 years after the introduction of ULEZ. 

Prior to the study, children living in these traffic areas had reduced lung size and reduced lung function.

Key findings of the study were that after the introduction of ULEZ, London children not only had reversed stunting of the growth of their lungs, with many of them coming back up to the normal size expected for their lungs, but they also had increased lung capacity. The proportion of London children suffering from clinically impaired lung capacity had dropped significantly.

This is such an important finding for protecting the health of our children.

This study provides strong evidence that traffic-related air pollution is a serious risk factor for lung disease and early death and behoves us all to take the impact of our use of fossil fuels very seriously, driving being the most significant contributant of air pollution.

Despite controversy, Sheffield Councillors introduced a CAZ in 2023, and pollution levels have dropped sharply. 

Dr Laura-Jane Smith, a London consultant in Respiratory Medicine, sees patients every day in her clinics who are fighting for their breath. She said that her adult patients who live in the ULEZ area are also reporting that they are breathing better and they are having fewer flare-ups that could see them end up in hospital. 

Now there is clear proof of how much harm is done to the lungs by vehicle use. So should we all start asking ourselves, ‘How essential is it for me to make this journey by car?’

The argument that has been used by some car drivers that any driving restrictions are ‘infringements of their rights’ must be weighed against infringement of the right of the rest of us, particularly children, but also adults, the right to breathe clean air, and the serious life-shortening consequences of breathing polluted air.