Air Pollution, Asthma and Housing Responsibility
17/02/2026
Jenny Danson
How Ella’s case reframes environmental exposure as a core housing and health risk
Air pollution is now recognised as a direct contributor to respiratory illness, cardiovascular disease and early mortality. The death of nine year old Ella Adoo Kissi-Debrah, and the coroner’s conclusion that illegal levels of outdoor air pollution materially contributed to her asthma and death, marked a turning point in how the UK understands environmental exposure. It established air pollution as an avoidable health risk rather than a background environmental condition.
For Housing, Planning and Public Health organisations, this case reshaped the assessment of risk within neighbourhoods, homes and the wider built environment. It reinforced the principle that exposure to pollutants is a determinant of health outcomes in the same way that damp, mould, cold and structural hazards are. Rosamund Kissi-Debrah’s work since the inquest continues to highlight the implications for policy, design and operational practice.
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