The M8 slow lane would resemble a scene from The Walking Dead

MY FIRST car, the snot-green MG Midget, didn’t come with air conditioning but that was perfectly okay. Its cloth roof folded back on rusty hinges to offer ‘wind in the hair’ (also known as stone chips in the forehead) driving, while in winter the bullet holes in its bodywork provided plentiful ventilation.

Through the years and a variety of increasingly bad buys – let’s please throw a veil of charity over the Volvo 480 with the permanently popped-up headlights – I finally got round to buying cars that had proper roofs. But even then air con was not included in the purchase. In those days, such an extravagance was still regarded as an optional extra and only for those who could afford it.

Again, this wasn’t a problem: in my experience most cars came with windows that folded down into the doors. Free fresh air for everyone!

Now, of course, almost every car comes with air con as standard but with such frivolous frippery come new dangers. A new study carried out by boffins at Emissions Analytics has analysed the effectiveness of the airconditioning filtering systems across 11 popular models.

Shockingly, it discovered that from the 57,000 toxic particles in every cubic centimetre of roadside air sample, all emanating from vehicles’ exhaust fumes, conditioning units were filtering out sometimes as little as one per cent.

According to the report, this means you, I, Granny Ina and even Pat the dog are all potentially inhaling up to 28 million particles with every breath. These toxins can lead to respiratory health issues.

Volkswagen Polos and Ford Fiestas are among the models listed that are potentially putting owners at risk because of their poor filtering systems.

The Toyota C-HR was found to have the worst performing filter, while the MercedesBenz E-Class, magically filtered out 90% of pollutants even when gridlocked in heavy, huffing-puffing traffic.

So what’s to be done? Not a lot, it seems: astonishingly, there are no government standards laid down on filtration systems.

What ‘expert advice’ on avoiding bad air that does exist lays out two options.

The first is to choose a less congested route, which really isn’t feasible for most commuters as there are more cars than there are roads.

The second is to avoid using cars at all, opting instead for public transport, walking, or even better a bike such as the fabulous creation from Hummingbird featured to my right. After all, as Friends of the Earth point out, an estimated 69% of journeys we make are actually less than five miles or under.

Walking would certainly have health benefits and contribute to the reduction of air pollution but on those first few mornings the M8 slow lane would resemble a scene from The Walking Dead, as thousands of disoriented commuters shuffled to work.

Thankfully, on a personal note, according to figures from EarthSense, which monitors NO2 concentrations in 100 x 100m squares across the UK, on a scale of one to six my home in Argyll rates a one or ‘good’. I guess, if you’re elsewhere, short of a gas mask as standard, you’ll just have to suck it up.

The Hummingbird Electric bike