Health experts say visitors to an Aberdeen medical centre are being forced to breathe “toxic air” each time they visit for treatment.
The Aberdeen Community Health and Care Village cost more than £15 million to build and opened on Frederick Street, just off King Street, in 2014.
The complex is described as an “urban hospital without beds” and features minor surgery suites alongside 29 consulting rooms.
It includes radiology, cardiac, podiatry, speech and language, dietetics and sexual health services.
But visitors to the site have now been warned that their health is at risk from the surrounding air, which breaches safe pollution limits.
The findings were revealed as part of a study undertaken by the British Lung Foundation (BLF) and Cambridge Environmental Research Consultants.
The two organisations have now urged the UK Government to curb pollution levels.
BLF director of policy, Alison Cook, said: “It is unacceptable that vulnerable people with NHS appointments are being exposed to toxic air that could make their health worse.
“It can’t be right that hospital staff and GPs must care for people in environments that could worsen their symptoms and could be putting them at risk of a whole range of health problems further down the line.”
The BLF found that more than 2,000 GP surgeries, clinics and hospitals across the UK are situated in areas that breach air pollution limits.
The study showed that 2,220 GP practices and 248 hospitals are in areas where average levels of tiny particle pollution, known as “particulate matter”, are above limits recommended by the World Health Organisation.
These particles, the majority of which come from traffic in urban areas, are linked to diseases including asthma, coronary heart disease, stroke, and lung cancer.
Major children’s hospitals Great Ormond Street in London and Birmingham’s Children Hospital were among those deemed to be in “dangerously polluted” areas.
The BLF believes the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) must act to limit air pollution as part of the forthcoming Environment Bill.
