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<br />6) Stop using taxpayers’ money to fund pollution. <br />The economic damage from COVID-19 and the necessary control measures, is very real, and <br />will place huge pressure on Government finances. Financial reform will be unavoidable in <br />recovering from COVID-19, and a good place to start is with fossil fuel subsidies. <br />Globally, about US$400 billion every year of taxpayers’ money is spent directly subsidizing the <br />fossil fuels that are driving climate change and causing air pollution. Furthermore, private and <br />social costs generated by health and other impacts from such pollution are generally not built <br />into the price of fuels and energy. Including the damage to health and the environment that they <br />cause, brings the real value of the subsidy to over US$5 trillion per year- more than all <br />governments around the world spend on healthcare – and about 2,000 times the budget of WHO. <br />Placing a price on polluting fuels in line with the damage they cause would approximately halve <br />outdoor air pollution deaths, cut greenhouse gas emissions by over a quarter, and raise about 4% <br />of global GDP in revenue. We should stop paying the pollution bill, both through our pockets <br />and our lungs. <br /> <br /> <br />7