I breathed in traffic smoke to find out what air pollution does to my body

This summary is generated by artificial intelligence and reviewed by the editorial team.

Deposits of black carbon from atmospheric pollution have been found in the human body, including in placentas, whose external analysis has been carried out after birth.

“There is no reason for one organ to be preferred over another, so they are most likely everywhere,” Liu says.

And there are other forms of air pollution, such as nitrogen oxides, which are gases invisible under a microscope but are known to cause damage.

The World Health Organization (WHO) states that 99% of the world’s population breathes polluted air, causing seven million deaths a year. A report from the Royal College of Physicians estimates that the figure in the United Kingdom is 30,000 deaths a year.

Stephen Holgate, who led that report, said there was no doubt that air pollution was damaging our health – “it’s clear, it’s a no-brainer” – and the most obvious evidence came from areas that were reducing air pollution and seeing the benefits.

But now that air pollution is “largely invisible,” unlike the smog of yesteryear, most of us don’t realize we’re breathing it and “we don’t really understand that everyday air pollution is harmful,” he says.