Children in Maribyrnong are being hospitalised with asthma at almost twice the national rate, prompting calls for improvements to air quality.
The first Australian Atlas of Healthcare Variation released last week by the Australian Commission on Safety and Quality in Health Care, reveals 73 Maribyrnong children spent time in hospital with asthma and related respiratory conditions from 2010-11 to 2012-13.
The rate of 531 per 100,000 children aged three to 19 was 72 per cent higher than the national average, and more than triple the rate of Stonnington in Melbourne’s east.
Western suburbs Greens MP Colleen Hartland said the data proves again just how much children’s health is suffering from truck diesel pollution.
“We need a commitment from Dan Andrews that this will come to an end, that container trucks will be banned from local streets” she said.
“The people of Maribyrnong deserve clean, fresh air.”
Ms Hartland said the government has been negligent in not proceeding with the port-rail connection, a project with the potential to remove up to 3500 polluting trucks off local streets a day.
A spokeswoman for Health Minister Jill Hennessy said the health department would work with clinicians and patients to review the atlas’s findings.
