T minus 18 days: Flashback to London, 1952

I was walking home from work the other day, breathing in the fumes from engines and catalytic converters that hadn't been allowed to warm up. Anyways I was reminded of my all-time favorite graph (because who doesn't have one?):


This graph is from the Great Smog of 1952, which occurred in London from December 5-9. Mortality per week is on the left axis. Over the course of 4 days, a cold fog settled on London, prompting residents to fire up their (high sulfur) coal-burning stoves. Total deaths attributed to the smog is estimated to be about 12,000: 4,000 during the event and 8,000 in the months afterwards. One doctor recounted: "There weren't bodies lying around in the street and no one really noticed that more people were dying. One of the first indications was that undertakers were running out of coffins and florists were running out of flowers." (source)

My point is that nowadays we don't really think of ambient air quality as an acute medical problem- thanks largely in part to the federal clean air laws. In response to the Great Smog of 1952, the UK passed the Clean Air Act of 1956. Seven years later, the United States passed the original Clean Air Act of 1963.