Smog Hike Calls Attention To Lives Claimed By Pollution
Posted September 23, 2007 12:00 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
There were 28 smog alert days in Toronto during the summer of 2007, and on the first day of fall some environmentally-aware Torontonians took it upon themselves to call attention to another important statistic.
“We have put a face to the 1,700 smog deaths that take place in this city,” said organizer Franz Hartmann of the Toronto Environmental Alliance at the Smog Walk Sunday in an attempt to raise awareness over a shocking fact from Toronto Public Health.
“And each one of these silhouettes represents one person who died needlessly and prematurely because of smog.”
Event organizers marched participants along Yonge Street in the city’s downtown core, putting paper silhouettes of respiratory illness victims on 1,700 street lamp posts along the way.
“We have to demand of our elected officials to do something to stop these completely avoidable deaths,” Hartmann added at a speech to those in attendance.
To see more from Sunday’s Smog Hike, click on the video link.
