WEEHAWKEN, NJ – JULY 18: Children play in a park in front of the skyline of lower Manhattan and One World Trade Center on a night with a hazy sunset in New York City on July 18, 2023, as seen from Weehawken, New Jersey. (Photo by Gary Hershorn/Getty Images)
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Nearly half of the children in the U.S. are breathing unhealthy levels of air pollution, despite significant progress in improving air quality, according to a new analysis.
Data from the American Lung Association’s annual State of the Air report shows 33.5 million children in the U.S., or 46% of people under 18 years old, live in an area that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution.
And more than 7 million children (10% of all kids) live in a community with failing grades for all three measures considered in the study, namely short-term particle pollution (PM2.5), long-term particle pollution and ozone pollution.
Nearly half of the children in the U.S. are breathing unhealthy levels of air pollution, despite significant progress in improving air quality, according to a new analysis.
Data from the American Lung Association’s annual State of the Air report shows 33.5 million children in the U.S., or 46% of people under 18 years old, live in an area that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution.
And more than 7 million children (10% of all kids) live in a community with failing grades for all three measures considered in the study – short-term particle pollution (PM2.5), long-term particle pollution and ozone pollution.
The report looks at the latest quality-assured air quality data available for three years between 2022 and 2024.
In total, the report finds that 44% of people of all ages in the U.S. live in a county that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution.
The report also finds that a person of color in the U.S. is more than twice as likely as a white individual to live in a community with a failing grade on all three pollution measures.
It also mentions data centers as a growing source of air quality concern for communities across the country.
The report highlights the rapidly increasing number of data centers powered by fossil fuels, which can contribute significantly to local air pollution burdens.
The Association’s director for nationwide clean air advocacy, Diana Van Vleet said cleaning up dangerous air pollution is a critical step in reducing children’s risk of chronic diseases, in an interview.
Van Vleet added infants, children and teens are especially vulnerable to the health harms of breathing air pollution, as their lungs and bodies are still growing and they breathe more air for their body size than adults.
And the Association’s assistant vice president for nationwide clean air policy, Will Barrett said wildfire smoke has become one of the key air quality challenges over the last few years.
Barrett added the 2023 wildfires in Canada sent smoke across much of the U.S., which led to an increase in PM2.5 exposure.
While in 2024, extreme heat events led to increased ozone pollution throughout much of the country, particularly in the Mid-West.
“No region in the country is immune from the harms of air pollution, especially as our climate change crisis unfolds,” he told me.
Barrett added while there has been long-term progress in the 27 years the Association has been monitoring air quality for the annual report, the job of maintaining that progress is now becoming more difficult.
“We’re now under a situation where the federal EPA is currently rolling back and repealing clean air programs,” he said.
“And we are really concerned about the combined effort of the federal government to roll back, repeal and delay clean air standards, while the job of cleaning our air is becoming more challenging under a changing climate.”
The Moms Clean Air Force’s senior manager for field engagement and partnerships, Liz Hurtado, said more than 7 million children are living in communities that fail every air quality measure, and Hispanic families are more than three times as likely to be among them, in an email.
Hurtado added Latino families face higher rates of diabetes and heart disease, and when it comes to asthma, are twice as likely to end up in the emergency room.
“Polluted air doesn’t just make us sick, it hits a body that is already fighting harder,” she said.
The American Lung Association report comes as the Association of Science and Technology Centers (ASTC) and the biopharmaceutical company Sanofi publish a nationwide poll, which shows widespread concern about air quality.
According to the survey, 87% of parents are concerned about how air quality affects their own health and that of their family.
The executive director of the Seeding Action program, Dr. Rose Hendricks said the survey highlighted the high level of concern among parents, with 86% of parents saying they would like to learn more about air pollution, in an interview.
A separate report by the Clean Air Fund recently warned philanthropic funding to improve outdoor air quality is in danger of stagnating.
