UP to 500 people a year in Northern Ireland will die as a result of air pollution within a decade unless urgent action is taken by the assembly, a charity has warned.
The British Heart Foundation Northern Ireland (BHF NI) says air pollution presents a "major public health emergency."
It warned heart and circulatory disease deaths attributed to particulate matter air pollution could exceed 4,500 over the next decade.
Estimates already put such deaths at around11,000 in the UK every year, with more than 300 in Northern Ireland.
BHF-funded research has shown that high levels of air pollution can make existing heart conditions worse and increase the risk of a heart attack or stroke, with fine particulate matter building up around the body, including in the fatty plaques of diseased arteries.
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Head of BHF NI Fearghal McKinney said "our toxic air is a public health emergency, and we haven't done enough to tackle this threat to our society".
"We need to ensure that stricter, health-based air quality guidelines are adopted into law to protect the health of the nation as a matter of urgency," he said.
He said Northern Ireland needs to adopt World Health Organization (WHO) guidelines into law.
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