Jack Tame: We need to sort out air pollution

Pop quiz! What of these causes the highest number of premature New Zealand deaths? 

Bowel cancer? Diabetes? Road crashes? Melanoma? Air pollution?

This will seem unbelievable to many Kiwis, but according to the Ministry of the Environment and Statistics New Zealand, here in good old clean-and-green New Zealand, air pollution kills more people than all of those other causes, combined. 

Think about that! Diabetes, bowel cancer, road crashes and melanoma... Put them in a blender and add them all together, and air pollution still comes out at the top of the macabre pops. 

According to the study released today, even though air pollution standards have improved, in 2019, air pollution was associated with 3200 deaths! 

In a country our size, with our wealth, and our regulatory framework, that's a disgraceful figure.

According to the triennial study, one in ten deaths in 2019 was attributable to air pollution. The social costs are in the billions of dollars, and that doesn't include the increasingly-well-documented impact on brain function and intelligence that comes from the prolonged exposure to air pollution. 

Like all health stats, of course, poor people in poor communities are the most negatively affected. 

The biggest cause is no big surprise: Traffic pollution. But as the science improves, the impact of traffic on air pollution only gets worse.

The report suggests roughly seventy percent of those air pollution deaths and seventy percent of more-than-13,000 hospitalisations from air pollution are caused by traffic pollution. And where you take cars off the road, lo and behold... The air quality improves.

If ever you needed a greater reason for better investment in public transport services, for massively speeding up the EV rollout and for congestion charging in our cities... This report is it. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Okay, pop quiz, what of these do you think causes
the highest number of premature deaths in New Zealand? Okay,
bit of a macarb pop quiz? But what of these
do you think causes the highest number of premature deaths?
Bowel cancer, diabetes, road crashes, melanoma, air pollution. This is

(00:21):
going to seem unbelievable to many Keiwis, but according to
the Ministry of the Environment Statistics New Zealand, here in
good old cleaning green one hundred percent pure New Zealand,
air pollution kills more people than all of those other
causes combined. Just think about that, diabetes, bowel cancer, road crashes, melanoma.

(00:42):
Put them in a blender, add them all together, all
of those deaths, and air pollution still comes out top
of the macarb pops. That's crazy, isn't it so? According
to the study release today, even though air pollution standards
have improved, in twenty nineteen, air pollution was associated with
three two hundred deaths in New Zealand. That's more than

(01:02):
the number of people who died on nine to eleven.
In a country our size, with our wealth and with
our regulatory framework, you would have to say more than
three thousand deaths every year attributable to air pollution is
a disgraceful figure. It is. It's disgraceful. According to the
triennial study, about one in ten deaths in twenty nineteen

(01:24):
was attributable to air pollution. The social costs are in
the billions of dollars, and that doesn't include the increasingly
well documented impact on brain function and intelligence that comes
from prolonged exposure to air pollution. Now, like all health
stats are, of course, poor people in poor communities are
the most negatively affected. The biggest cause is no surprise though,

(01:48):
it's traffic pollution. But as the science improves, the impact
of traffic pollution of traffic on air pollution only gets worse.
So basically, traffic causes us way more harm than we
previously understood. The report suggests that get us about seventy
percent of the air pollution debts and about seventy percent

(02:08):
of more than thirteen thousand annual hospitalizations from air pollution
are caused from traffic pollution seventy percent. And of course,
when you take the cars off the road long and behold,
the air quality improves. So if you ever needed a
greater reason, for better investment in public transport services, for

(02:30):
massively speeding up the EV rollout, and for congestion charging
in our cities. I reckon three two hundred deaths a year?
Is it tame? For more? From Heather Duplessy Allen Drive.
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