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News release
13.01.2020
For immediate use
Air pollution around Ealing Hospital must be monitored
Local London Assembly Member, Dr Onkar Sahota AM, has written to the Mayor urging him to include Ealing Hospital in City Hall’s Breathe London air quality monitoring scheme. Dr Sahota has stressed the need for “access to robust and comprehensive” data to tackle the issue of air pollution locally and protect the health of patients.
The Breathe London scheme was launched in January 2019 to establish the world’s largest air quality monitoring network, and now comprises over one hundred fixed sensors across the capital.
As a component of the scheme, air pollution monitors have been installed at ten London hospitals. However, Ealing Hospital has not yet been included in the network.
In his letter to Mayor, Dr Sahota highlights that Ealing Hospital is one of the busiest single sites in the country situated on a major traffic artery, with at least 68,625 A&E attendances recorded in 2018/19. Dr Sahota also notes that the latest data shows that the closest Breathe London roadside monitoring station to Ealing Hospital, at Wyndham Road, has recorded NO2 levels above the WHO limit on twelve days in September 2019.
Dr Sahota progresses to underline the concerns of local residents that after the expansion of the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) to the North and South Circulars next year, Ealing Hospital will still remain outside of the extended boundary.
Within the first eight months of the Breathe London scheme, high levels of air pollution were detected by 40% of the sensors. In October, the Mayor announced that the programme will be extended until at least July 2020.
Local London Assembly Member, Dr Onkar Sahota AM, said:
“I am fully behind the plethora of actions that City Hall is taking to improve air quality, but to effectively tackle the issue of pollution on a local level, we need access to robust and comprehensive data.
“This is why I am urging the Mayor to include Ealing Hospital in the Breathe London scheme, which has been extended to operate until at least July. As a busy hospital located on a major traffic artery, it is crucial that its surrounding air pollution levels and its impact on patients and visitors are properly monitored.
“It will also be doubly important to measure pollution at key sites outside the expanded ULEZ, so that the outcomes of the policy can be accurately measured.”
ENDS