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Government Should Cut Pollution, Not Just Measure It: Environmental Group

Posted on: Monday, 9 July 2007, 18:18 CDT

By MARIA BABBAGE

TORONTO (CP) - Canadians will be better able to hold politicians and businesses accountable on air pollution with the help of a new tool to measure the impact of bad air on public health, federal Environment Minister John Baird said Monday.

The new Air Quality Health Index, launched Monday in Toronto as an 18-month pilot project similar to ones held in British Columbia and Nova Scotia, will advise residents on health risks associated with the level of local air pollution.

The Conservative government intends to spend $30 million over the next four years to establish the new national index across Canada and expanding the air quality forecast program to support it, Baird told a news conference.

"When we give information to the public, they're best able to make choices for themselves on bad air-quality days," he said.

"It also though is an important opportunity for the public, over the medium term, to hold government and industry for the quality of the air that we breathe."

But governments should be doing more than measuring pollution - they should be taking concrete action to reduce it, said Franz Hartmann of the Toronto Environmental Alliance.

"They have a tool to gauge the problem, but nothing, no new announcement today about how to actually clean the air," he said after the launch.

Ontario Environment Minister Laurel Broten, who spoke at the launch, was mum on when the Liberal government would finally make good on a four-year-old promise to phase out the province's pollutant-spewing coal-fired power stations, Hartmann noted.

"If this (index) is what constitutes cleaning the air for the federal government, we are in for many more smoggy days and thousands and thousands of more deaths this year and the year after that."

The Conservatives have come under fire from opposition parties and other critics for the plan Baird introduced in April to reduce greenhouse gases and air pollution. Despite intense pressure to meet Canada's emissions-cutting commitments under the Kyoto Protocol, the Tories say those targets can't be met without disastrous economic consequences.

The new index adds to an existing provincial index, which measures air quality on a scale of 0 to 100 or more, with a reading of 32 indicating relatively good quality. Ontario's air quality index also issues smog alerts when the amount of pollution in the air worsens, which happens primarily in the summer.

The new index reports health risks on a coloured scale of 1 to 10 and higher: the greater the value, the greater the risk. It looks at a combination of common pollutants - ozone, nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter - to determine the relative risks.

It also provides specialized advice to people who may be more sensitive to air pollution, such as seniors or those with health conditions, but doesn't issue alerts.

What makes the new index so different is that it's the first one in the world to communicate the health risks involved with air pollution and provide protective health advice, said Health Minister Tony Clement.

Air pollution is getting worse, not better, said Clement, who spoke at the Toronto launch along with Broten and Toronto Mayor David Miller.

About 5,900 deaths each year in eight Canadian cities are linked to air pollution, Clement said. It also affects those with lung conditions such as asthma and bronchitis, diabetes and heart problems, which strains Canada's health-care system, he added.

In Toronto, air pollution is responsible for 1,700 premature deaths and 6,000 hospital admissions each year, said Dr. David McKeown, the city's medical officer of health.

While there are no plans to replace Ontario's air quality index with the new national index, "it's one of the things we'll learn from the pilot," McKeown said.

The pilot project is the first of its kind in Ontario and is expected to expand to the greater Toronto area next year.

Source: Canadian Press

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