On 19 November 2008, HEAL and the European Federation of Allergy and Airways Diseases Patients’ Associations (EFA) launched a new website for European citizens to check national and local air quality and to learn the steps they can take to minimise any adverse effects.

The website “Know Your Air for Health” (www.knowyourairforhealth.eu) is especially tailored to the needs of people suffering from conditions that affect their ability to breathe comfortably during periods of high air pollution. The website also provides information about the current action of the European Union to improve air quality.

Up to one in 10 European adults have COPD and many fear leaving their homes on a day of high air pollution. "It is unacceptable that the most susceptible people cannot be guaranteed clean air at all times - but at least now they can better plan their activities in periods when air pollution is high," Susanna Palkonen of EFA says.

"Air quality within the European Union is still not good enough to protect health," says Christian Farrar-Hockley, Senior Policy Advisor at HEAL. "The WHO estimates that the average person within the EU is loosing one year of life as a result of poor air quality. The website helps explain the different policies and thus provides opportunity to become involved in the debate."

Although European Union has a "Thematic Strategy on Air Quality", the new ambient air quality directive (2008/50/EC) needs to be effectively implemented if it is to bring significant benefits to people with respiratory diseases.

EFA and its national members who are partnering in the website project, are writing to health and environment ministers in all EU countries about the entry into force of the new ambient air quality directive, highlighting how patients’ groups could significantly contribute to the implementation of this regulation.

By providing people with COPD or other respiratory diseases with air pollution forecasts, EFA and HEAL hope to reduce unnecessary suffering, illness, exacerbations and hospital admissions due to air pollution.