Ella Kissi-Debrah’s little body could take it no more. In 2013, the nine-year-old died after an acute asthma attack after living the whole of her short life 30 metres from London’s busy South Circular road, with repeated visits to the hospital following frequent seizures.The coroner pronounced in 2020 that the toxic fumes she had breathed because of the traffic on the roadway were partly to blame. It was the first known instance of the law recognising air pollution as a cause of death.Yet public health experts believe that Kissi-Debrah was a victim of a far more widespread, global emergency. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that air pollution is responsible for more than seven million premature deaths every year around the world, contributing to pulmonary and heart diseases, lung cancer and respiratory infections. Almost all of the world’s population – 99 percent – breathes air that is dirtier than levels recommended by the WHO.
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