Brussels (Brussels Morning) – Brussels grapples with severe air pollution, prompting calls for stringent measures ahead of local elections to address health risks.
Brussels is one of the most contaminated cities in Europe. As voters are scheduled to elect members of local and regional parliaments in the forthcoming months, professionals are calling on politicians to take more stringent measures against air pollution.
According to IS Global Research, Brussels is ranked eighth out of over 800 EU cities for high nitrogen dioxide grades. Citizens are exposed to engagements of fine particles (PM2.5) and nitrogen dioxide that are two and five terms higher than the World Health Organisation (WHO) suggestions.
According to Brussels Time, air pollution is linked with an expanded risk of cardiovascular disease, strokes and dementia as well as certain kinds of diabetes and cancers. In light of these worrying stats, a total of 140 health and environment professionals including doctors, scientists, and health and environmental experts wrote an open note to Brussels politicians, calling on them to take a more challenging stance against air pollution ahead of the elections on 9 June and the local elections in October.
Is Brussels’ Air Killing Its Citizens?
“Every year, more than 900 Brussels locals die prematurely as a result of inadequate air quality,” the experts noted in the letter. This correlates to more than two deaths per day, and more than 10% of all casualties in the Belgian capital. The news comes just after the French-speaking socialists PS joined centrists Défi in calling for the relaxing of one individual measure put in place to fight air pollution, namely the Low Emission Zone (LEZ), requesting the region to delay the ban on Euro-5 cars in Brussels.
Are Brussels’ Children Safe from Air Pollution?
The experts stated that society’s most vulnerable are also most at threat of health complications as a result of air pollution. “Children, for example, are especially vulnerable to air pollution because their metabolism is still evolving, because they breathe quickly and because, due to their small size, they are packed to sources of pollution such as car exhausts.” “Fighting air pollution therefore helps to safeguard the health of the youngest children,” they continued.
Air pollution also has a more significant impact on low-income households, as they are more likely to live in neighbourhoods that are more contaminated, resulting in life expectancy dropping significantly. “For these people, admission to green spaces, sporting actions and healthy food is often complex and does little or nothing to counteract the harmful effects of pollutants on their health.” On top of the danger fine particles and nitrogen dioxide pose to people’s fitness, air pollution is also a monetary drain. “In 2018, it cost the Brussels area €1.6 billion, or a standard of €1,400 per resident of Brussels in that year alone.”
While the European Union is studying air quality standards to make them more rigid and bring them closer to WHO recommendations, the experts discussed these will still be inadequate to adequately safeguard the health of city-dwellers. They therefore stepped up the stress on candidates to handle the pollution urgently.
Should Brussels Follow Other Cities’ LEZ Examples?
The experts asked for strict enforcement of the LEZ, “namely an annulment of diesel engines by 2030 and petrol engines by 2035 at the latest on the entire territory”. Here, experts expressed Brussels should glance at other EU capitals as an example, where more stringent LEZ rules were presented quicker than planned. Paris and Amsterdam project to prohibit all cars running on fossil fuels by 2030, while London has expanded its “ultra LEZ” despite fierce opposition. The signatories also urge for more low-traffic communities as territory of the Good Move policy, as was accomplished in the centre of Brussels. “The decline in road traffic (by 15 to 20% in one year in the Pentagon community) means a decrease in air pollution, but also noise and the risk of accidents.”
