8 Dec 2020
Air pollution and Covid19
Green Party Women held a conference on air pollution and covid19 earlier this year with Dr Liza Selley and Rebecca Popovic from Cambridge University and pioneering campaigner and mother of Ella Kissi-Debrah, Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah.
Rebeka Popovic PhD student, MRC Toxicology Unit Rebeka Popovic is a PhD student at the MRC Toxicology Unit. Her PhD project explores molecular mechanisms underlying neurodegeneration in a fruit fly model of Parkinson’s disease. She graduated from Kings College London with a MSc in Neuroscience and from University of Surrey with a BSc in Biochemistry. Her interest in air pollution began when she volunteered in a public engagement project, MRC Festival of Research & Clean Air Day in Manchester, helping to bring the science of air pollution closer to children. Whilst in lockdown, together with her fellow PhD students, she took on a data analysis challenge, investigating the relationship between air pollution and COVID-19 in England, in order to help with the current pandemic. Dr Liza Selley UKRI Innovation Research Fellow Twitter: @DrLizaSelley Liza joined the MRC Toxicology Unit (University of Cambridge), after completing her PhD in air pollution toxicity at Imperial College, London. Her research explores why and how air pollutants cause harm to the body, focusing on the biological changes that they create in the lungs as well as their role in promoting airway infections. Much of this work is done through laboratory experiments, using human cells, bacteria and sometimes urine. Keen to expand our understanding beyond the effects of diesel exhaust exposure, Liza’s projects are based on pollutants that currently have little or no government regulation. These include non-exhaust traffic emissions like brake dust, biodiesel exhaust and aviation emissions. Carrying out regular public engagement work, she hopes to raise awareness of these harmful pollutants.
Rosamund Adoo-Kissi-Debrah Co-founder, Ella Roberta Family Foundation Rosamund set up the Ella Roberta Family Foundation after the death of her beloved daughter in 2013 from a rare and severe form of asthma. The aim of the Foundation is to improve the lives of children affected by asthma in South East London by raising awareness of asthma, campaigning for better treatment of asthma and campaigning for clean air as it is everyone’s fundamental right to breathe clean air. As the Executive Director, Rosamund raises awareness of the dangers of asthma in young people and their families through education, by having assemblies in schools, visiting local community groups, and advising health professionals on how the general public can access better treatment. She also represents the views of parents with children with asthma to clinicians and decision makers involved in the commissioning or provision of care and services for young people with the condition.
