Why London’s New, Air Pollution Statue Of A Child, Ella, Matters To 4,000 Cities
Air pollution kills. And now there's a sombre monument - to mark one death in London. Other cities are far more polluted. So can it galvanise action to start saving eight million deaths annually?
London now has a life-sized statue of a young girl, Ella. But this memorial should not stand as a monument; it should serve as a stark reminder of a life that should never have been lost so young, at the tender age of nine. She should not have been exposed to illegal levels of air pollution that killed her, as a court ruled.
This is Ella Kissi-Debrah’s story, and it is relevant to every child inhaling illegal levels of pollution anywhere in the world.
On February 15, 2013, nine-year-old Ella Kissi-Debrah had an asthmatic episode at home in London and was taken to hospital where she suffered a cardiac arrest from which she could not be resuscitated.
She is the first person in the world to have air pollution listed as part of the cause of death on her death certificate after a years-long legal battle led by her mother, who wanted to know what caused her child’s sudden asthma just before she turned seven and killed her just a couple of years later.
A reinvestigation in 2020 blamed vehicular pollution. It said she was exposed to levels of nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter above the World Health Organization’s Guidelines, and the principal source of her exposure was traffic emissions close to her home in London. The cause of death was acute respiratory failure, severe asthma and air pollution exposure.
Ella’s mother, Rosamund Adoo Kissi Debrah, said at the occasion that she felt “incredibly emotional today. Seeing how small Ella looks up there brings it home how much time has passed since she died.” The statue is four feet, six inches tall, the same as the child was when she died. "I hope Ella’s statue will help raise awareness of the dangers of poor air quality and the importance of clean air for everyone."
Unveiling the statue along with her mother was the Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, known for making some hard and unpopular decisions like the Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) to clean the city’s air. Air pollution, he said, is not only an environmental crisis but “a matter of social justice, which affects us all, from cradle to grave.”
The Mayor’s office was among those who donated GBP 65,000, approx. Rs 73 lakh at current rates for the statue. Much of it was crowdsourced as well.
That’s because Ella is the not only the first but so far the only case in the world where air pollution is certified to be the cause of death, something that’s now written in stone on her pedestal.
Yet recent research shows that about 8.1 million annual deaths were linked to air pollution in 2021. Alarmingly, more than half of these are in China and India, with an estimated 2.3 and 2.1 million, respectively.
“We cannot see the toxic air we are breathing in every day, but hopefully this statue will remind us to stop and think, and for decision makers and politicians to do what is right and clean up the air we breathe,” Sadiq says.
What Ella’s case shows is the impact that traffic pollution has along the roads, even in a city with comparatively lower air pollution.
Last year, London’s average pollution was 7.8 micrograms/cubic metre of PM 2.5 (particulate matter that is microscopic and lethal), down over a third over the last seven years. The WHO’s guideline is 5 micrograms.
A recent study by the Health Effects Institute (HEI), Boston, points out that air pollution–linked asthma has the highest health impacts on children between 5–14 years of age, especially in high-income countries. But rapid urbanisation and population growth in Asia and Africa are leading to an increase in asthma linked to air pollution, according to HEI’s State of Global Air 2024.
London is among the cleaner large cities globally. There are 4,292 cities ranked higher than London as per IQAir, a Swiss air quality firm’s latest rankings. The top most, including large cities like Delhi, India’s capital, and Lahore in Pakistan, where the PM 2.5 averaged over 100 micrograms. In India, almost 35% of all deaths were related to air pollution, HEI estimates.
If kids in ‘cleaner’ London are suffering, one can only imagine the health impact on children and adults in far more polluted cities.
Air pollution is linked to dozens of deadly diseases and debilitating conditions. However, many national governments and city administrations have not officially accepted that air pollution kills and take consequent policy action. Can Ella’s small statue send a message of urgency that a mountain of research hasn’t achieved?