Air pollution costs the Maltese economy an annual €550 million in disease and death, killing an estimated 230 people a year, according to a new study by the World Health Organisation.

The cost is equivalent to 5.4 per cent of the island’s gross domestic product.

The study, ‘Economic cost of the health impact of air pollution in Europe’, is the first assessment of the economic burden of deaths and diseases resulting from outdoor and indoor air pollution in the 53 countries of the WHO European Region.

It found that, in 2010, 228 people died prematurely in Malta due to air pollution – particulate matter in the air.

Read more on Times of Malta.

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