Clean air progress has stalled in Ontario, increased ground-level ozone threatens health, OMA report says

In its report entitled "Ontario’s Stagnant Air: Stalled progress in the 1990s," the organization representing Ontario’s physicians called for governments to focus on reducing air pollution based on the health effects of the pollutants in the air we breathe.

The report, based on government statistics, found that, ground-level ozone concentrations have been rising an average of 0.5% every summer since 1980. Progress in removing particles from the air we breathe – including health-damaging sulphates – has stalled since 1995, the report says.

"The fact that ground-level ozone is rising in Ontario while small particle concentrations are not declining is of particular concern because these two poisons are known to be harmful to health. These toxins can settle in the lungs and cause coughing, chest tightness, aggravation of asthma, bronchitis and emphysema, decreased lung function, and go on to cause heart attacks," said OMA President Dr. Kenneth Sky.

"We need to focus our efforts on reducing the poisons in the air that are directly affecting our health," said Dr. Ted Boadway, the OMA’s director of health policy.

Other findings in the report include:

• Progress has stalled in reducing the ambient air concentrations of the building blocks of smog: nitrogen oxides (NOx), sulphur dioxide (SO₂), and volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Significant progress achieved since the 1970s through the first half of the 1990s has stalled.
• Average ground-level ozone concentrations are increasing summer and winter, in rural areas and urban – wherever you live in Ontario.
• While air quality is getting worse or staying the same, depending on the pollutant measured, scientists are finding that there is no "safe" level for many air pollutants, including ground-level ozone and particulates.

• Governments have made some progress implementing the OMA’s recommendations made in its 1998 smog report. Of 18 recommendations, six have been completed, six partially completed and no progress has been made on three others.

"Now we have discovered the air we breathe is filled with an increasing amount of poisonous ozone while other pollutants are not declinging. This is alarming for the health of our patients because we now know that there is no safe level for these poisons," he said.

The Ontario Medical Association therefore recommends:

• Reducing the concentration of ozone and particulates in Ontario’s air and reversing the recent trend of increasing ozone concentrations and little improvement in particulate levels in Ontario.
• Changing Ontario’s approach to air pollution, basing it on health effects of ambient air concentrations rather than emission limits.
• Focusing on the reduction of ambient concentrations of ozone and inhalable and respirable particles, rather than emission data.
• Improving public access to real time air pollution data; include real time small particulate data on government web sites.

"Governments need to move further and faster in their efforts to reduce air pollution and help improve the health of their citizens," he said.

All three OMA smog reports can be found on our web site at: http://www/phealth/smogmain.htm