Clear your head, go for a walk and get some fresh air.
This is the classic advice to calm down after a stressful day to be able to decompress and relax, while also getting some exercise. But have you ever stopped to think about where you are walking and whether or not your walk could be doing more harm than good?
Due to the amount of people that live and work in cities, the amount of traffic that travels around cities daily is very high. And despite electric cars becoming more popular, petrol and diesel cars are still very common. It is these cars that cause the issues.
Traffic is a part of many people’s commute to work and extra time is usually taken into account when travelling to account for this traffic. But all this sitting in at traffic lights, in queues and road closures with car engines running all contribute to pollution.
Diesel vehicles in particular produce nitrogen dioxide, which is a toxic pollutant gas and can have harmful effects to health, including risk of heart disease, respiratory disease and lung cancer.
Not everyone has the privilege to live in the countryside, or to have a vehicle of their own. So, if you are someone that lives in a city, but walks everywhere on foot, breathing in these fumes daily could have long-lasting effects.
To attempt to combat pollution levels, the government introduced plans to implement ‘Clean Air Zones (CAZ)’ in cities back in 2015. The aim of the zones is to lower the amount of traffic in cities and improve the air quality. Today, there are currently seven Clean Air Zones in the UK.
Air pollution is a modern-day problem that we are aware of and one that could have detrimental effects to our health. Just last week, Londoners were told to avoid high levels of outdoor physical activities due to high pollution levels.
Local council schemes and initiatives regularly encourage the use of bikes, walking and public transport to get more vehicles off the road.
But unless we see more change soon, it may actually be bad for your health to take a stroll outside.
