Campaign group Mums for Lungs linked the figures to toxic air pollution reports Roshni Ray

Two women with small children holding a banner with the number 7523 printed on it, outside Barnet Hospital — Mums for Lungs campaigners outside Barnet Hospital – (Credit – Mum for Lungs)

Thousands of children were taken to a local hospital with breathing problems last year and a campaign says toxic air pollution is to blame.

According to new NHS figures obtained by the parent-led campaign group Mums for Lungs over 7,500 children with breathing problems were admitted to A&E or a hospital ward at Barnet Hospital within a year, out of a total of 114,000 admitted to hospitals across London.

Mums for Lungs says the scale of the health crisis is linked to toxic air pollution and is urging action from the Mayor of London, local councils and the government.

Dr Katie Knight, a paediatric emergency medicine consultant, based in Haringey, north London, said: “Every year we see thousands of children in London coming to A&E with severe breathing difficulties, many of whom will have had their symptoms exacerbated by toxic air pollution. With the NHS 10 Year Plan having just been published, the time to act is now to avoid a crisis in our health system that is entirely preventable.”

This data has sparked calls from parents to phase out diesel, polluting SUVs and domestic wood burning. Children are particularly vulnerable to air pollution because they breathe more rapidly and are closer to the ground, where pollutants like nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter are more concentrated. Previous research has shown that exposure to traffic pollution can stunt children’s lung growth by up to 14%.

Road transport remains the biggest source of harmful emissions in London, particularly diesel vehicles and SUVs that emit more CO₂ than smaller cars, and unnecessary domestic combustion such as wood burning is one of the major sources of particle pollution.

Frances Buckingham, a mother of two from Barnet said: “As a parent, I am deeply concerned about the impact of air pollution on my sons’ long-term health and it is troubling to see how many children are being admitted to hospital with respiratory conditions.

The Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) has shown that policies prioritising public health are effective in reducing harmful pollutants. We now need strong leadership at the local level in Barnet and beyond to further clean up the air and make London a healthier place to live, especially for its youngest residents.”

Research cited by Mums for Lungs from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air, estimated that excess nitrogen oxide emissions from diesel cars linked to “Dieselgate” will have caused 41,000 new cases of asthma in children between 2009 and 2040.

The Dieselgate scandal, or the Volkswagen emission scandal broke out in 2015 when diesel cars were found to be emitting more toxic air pollution on the roads than when they passed regulatory tests, due to the use of illegal “defeat devices”.

These defeat devices altered a vehicle’s emissions control system during testing to appear compliant with regulations, but operated differently under normal driving conditions, hence “cheating” the system.

Mums for Lungs is calling on UK politicians to meet WHO targets on nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter, at least as soon as this is happening across the EU, so children in the UK are as well protected as their European neighbours. They are also calling for a clear timeline to phase out existing diesel vehicles in London, starting with those implicated in the Dieselgate scandal.

Other conditions include a phase out of domestic wood burning where it is not the primary source of heating, restrictions on large SUVs, and an urgent funding for School Streets to be introduced across the country to protect children from toxic pollution at the school gate.

Jemima Hartshorn, founder and Director of Mums for Lungs, who lives in Southwark, said: “Across England, children’s health, their family lives, their schooling and their parents’ work lives are compromised because another Government is refusing to clean up our air – children are paying with their lungs and it’s costing our economy £500M a week too. ”

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