Air pollution: our health still insufficiently protected

Air pollution causes great harm to European citizens’ health. Each year, about 400 000 people die prematurely due to excessive air pollutants such as dust particles, nitrogen dioxide and ozone. For about 30 years, the EU has had clean air legislation that sets limits to the concentrations of pollutants in the air. Nevertheless, bad air is still common today in most of the EU Member States and in numerous European cities. We found that European citizens still breathe harmful air mostly due to weak legislation and poor policy implementation. Our recommendations aim to strengthen the Ambient Air Quality Directive and to promote further effective action by the European Commission and the Member States, including better policy coordination and public information.