The environmental pressure group Greenpeace has announced that on an average, 1,342 Greeks die every year due to air pollution, more than half of them in the capital Athens. "Up to 80 per cent of the air pollution in Greece comes from cars," says Stelios Psomas of Greenpeace. "We have to provide the public reliable and less polluting public transport," he suggests.

"The most sensitive groups are children, the elderly and the ailing," observes Psomas. "We know pollution kills, but until we make the number specific there doesn't seem to be enough concern to take measures," he informs.

To this end, the group commissioned a study that used a model created by the World Health Organisation and ambient air quality data provided by a Greek state service. The study showed that poor air quality killed an estimated 730 people on an average in Athens each year. Like Los Angeles, the Greek capital is notorious for photochemical smog.Its deadly cocktail of pollutants, such as ozone and nitrogen oxides, are produced when emissions from cars and industries are exposed to the Sun.