Air pollution report - 3,000 deaths demand that we act

Ireland’s reputation as a green and pleasant land will take another unwelcome but sadly justified blow with the publication of An Taisce’s shocking report that persistent exposure to severe air pollution is indirectly killing one person more or less every three hours — around eight people a day, 56 a week, 224 a month and nearly 3,000 a year.

These challenging figures also remind us that our complacency on environmental protection has a serious cost in human and economic terms.

The air pollution death toll puts the number of road deaths — a record low of 161 last year — very much in the ha’penny place. That almost 20 people die because of air pollution for every individual killed on our roads suggests that we might need to reappraise how we use finite resources to reduce unnecessary, premature deaths in this country.