How UKRI's Clean Air programme is tackling the UK's biggest enivronmental health risk

For Clean Air Day, we asked Dr Jenny Baverstock, outgoing UKRI Clean Air Co-Champion, to talk about how the Clean Air programme is driving vital research and developments to tackle air pollution.

In the UK, air pollution is viewed as the top environmental risk to public health. A Royal College of Physician’s report in 2016 stated that around 40,000 early deaths can be attributed to poor air quality.

On top of that, it’s estimated that air pollution has cost health services and business £20bn. Respiratory illnesses and conditions like cardiovascular disease are exacerbated by poor air quality. In 2020, an inquest concluded that nine year old Ella Adoo-Kissi-Debrah died of asthma contributed to by excessive air pollution. In the assistant coroner's Prevention of Future Deaths report in 202, recommendations were made that government set legally binding targets based on WHO guidelines, to reduce the number of deaths from air pollution in the UK.

COVID-19 has spotlighted respiratory health like never before in living memory. Lockdowns have given us a tantalising glimpse of how our world could change for the better in terms of pollution.

In 2018, the UKRI initiated a Clean Air Strategic Priorities Fund programme, which has been fortunate to receive funding in two waves to a total of £42.5 M.

The funding has been able to bring together researchers from a wide range of disciplines and partnerships to work together to increase knowledge of air pollution exposure effects on the public and in particular vulnerable groups (e.g. children and the elderly). The work is a partnership with UKRI, Met Office and Defra.

Since 2019 I have been working with fellow Champions, Professor Sir Stephen Holgate (Lead Champion, University of Southampton), Professor Martin Williams (Imperial College, who sadly died in 2020) and Dr Gary Fuller (Imperial College) who joined the team in 2021.

Our job is to catalyse new research into air pollution in relation to health and wider effects on the environment, and unify researchers and stakeholders around important air quality missions.

It has been inspiring to establish a programme of work bringing together outstanding researchers in medical and social science areas that were not well connected before.

Connecting the research community, industry and local and central government has been vital to communicate new knowledge on air pollution to benefit the health and wealth of the nation.

In my early work with the Champion team we held a series of meetings with leaders in government, across the charity sector and with other stakeholders to develop a roadmap for the programme.

In a nutshell, we identified several areas to target: advancing real world solutions; enhancing linkages between health/medical scientists and atmospheric scientists; a focus on opportunities to develop behaviour change strategies, advancement in data science in clean air and low cost sensor technology; developing a future workforce to tackle the toxicological issues of air pollutants and increased research on the indoor environment and connecting the programme with climate change initiatives. Finally and importantly, a greater access to information and education on the adverse health effects of air pollution.

My work as a co-Champion has been about a shared endeavour to work together to catalyse interactions for the SPF to bring a sense of cohesion across the programme.

As part of this team effort, for which I have been an integral part, we have also developed a set of informative commentaries. These will deliver increased knowledge and understanding of the challenges in air pollution and health risks going forward fed by data and modelling from the interdisciplinary programme of work.

In addition to this there are multiple other excellent areas of work generating information from the investments in research supported by the programme. Essential to our goal to build a cohesive programme is the need to provide platforms for knowledge exchange events and information in partnership with the Met Office, UKRI and Innovate UK. 

This was no mean feat as the pandemic has meant shifting these to online meetings requiring agility in what was a whole new way of working with some obstacles along the way with technology! However, this has come with distinct advantages in extending our reach to groups that otherwise might struggle to attend, such as Local Authorities and GPs, and being able hold events on line has extended these meetings to include early career researchers to give vital experience and make connections.

This year, I was particularly pleased to lead on public engagement via our April Annual Conference which connected the whole programme of 32 funded projects this year to the public. It was very valuable to gain insights from the public via citizen’s panels with perspectives on the research undertaken in the SPF.

This feature of our work is very much aligned with the UKRI’s vision for a research and innovation system that gives everyone the opportunity to contribute and to benefit, enriching lives locally, nationally and internationally.

The Champions and partners are building a legacy for the programme. As part of that the Champion team has developed a series of round table events, the Clean Air Research Futures Group, bringing the research ideas of early career researchers into the work of the programme to generate and establish future research ideas.

We have selected a range of topical themes and, with Gary leading the meetings, given researchers a platform to discuss. The latest in this series posed the question about what research is needed to understand and track inequalities and vulnerabilities in air pollution exposure This area of work was modelled on the work I had established at the University of Southampton working collectively with senior and future research leaders in air pollution and bringing together a partnership at the university.

A major strand of the work in the programme is around innovation – this area is led by Innovate UK – and the main focus is to create new products, services and solutions that can be commercialised. Successful growth in this Innovations from the wave 1 part of the programme have been successfully commercialised including international commercial interest with more innovations to come from Wave 2.

The UKRI SPFs are a major investment in UK research and they are very much connected with the 2022 UKRI strategy It has been great to see the embracement of non-linear careers in UKRI future world class science which has been the desire from researchers in the past.

Going forward, agile co-ordination and creativity are essential components as well as investment in constructive team work and recognising diversity and skills brought in from systems not only within academia and traditional science roles but enriching and integrating the research landscape with talent and diversity from other sectors to establish a future vibrant research culture.