1 in 3 Americans Live in Areas With Dangerous Air Pollution
This story originally appeared on Inside Climate News and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration.Within five miles of Kim Gaddy’s home in the South Ward of Newark, New Jersey, lies the nation’s third-busiest shipping port, 13th-busiest airport, and roughly a half-dozen major roadways. All told, transportation experts say, the area where Gaddy and her neighbors live sees an average of roughly 20,000 truck trips each day.Researchers cite the exhaust produced by all of that road travel as a major reason why asthma rates among Newark residents is about twice the national average.“You hear of Newark every time somebody gets killed, it’s a homicide, but asthma is the silent killer—and that is a real health injustice,” said Gaddy, 60, who founded the South Ward Environmental Alliance, a local climate change advocacy group. “You know, asthma, heart attacks, respiratory illnesses—these are the things that harm our community.”Kim Gaddy, founder of the South Ward Environmental Alliance, said asthma is a “silent killer” in her hometown of Newark, New Jersey. Gaddy and her three children were all diagnosed with asthma; her eldest son died of a heart attack in 2021 at the age of 32. Courtesy of South Ward Environmental AllianceThe South Ward is hardly an outlier. A new report by the American Lung Association shows how polluted air continues to place the health of millions of other Americans in jeopardy.The lung association’s latest “State of the Air” report—an annual survey of air quality nationwide—found that more than a third of all Americans, or about 131 million people, are living in communities with unhealthy levels of air pollution.The report also found that from 2020 to 2022 the nation experienced more days with air quality that would be classified by the association as hazardous than at any other time over the past quarter century.While acknowledging the efficacy of a series of clean-air measures that have been enacted over the past 50 years, officials with the association said that the report also underscored how the warming planet continues to worsen levels of unhealthy air.
Climate change is increasing the number of days people are exposed to hazardous pollution, affecting already disadvantaged communities the most.
This story originally appeared on Inside Climate News and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
Within five miles of Kim Gaddy’s home in the South Ward of Newark, New Jersey, lies the nation’s third-busiest shipping port, 13th-busiest airport, and roughly a half-dozen major roadways. All told, transportation experts say, the area where Gaddy and her neighbors live sees an average of roughly 20,000 truck trips each day.
Researchers cite the exhaust produced by all of that road travel as a major reason why asthma rates among Newark residents is about twice the national average.
“You hear of Newark every time somebody gets killed, it’s a homicide, but asthma is the silent killer—and that is a real health injustice,” said Gaddy, 60, who founded the South Ward Environmental Alliance, a local climate change advocacy group. “You know, asthma, heart attacks, respiratory illnesses—these are the things that harm our community.”
Kim Gaddy, founder of the South Ward Environmental Alliance, said asthma is a “silent killer” in her hometown of Newark, New Jersey. Gaddy and her three children were all diagnosed with asthma; her eldest son died of a heart attack in 2021 at the age of 32.
Courtesy of South Ward Environmental AllianceThe South Ward is hardly an outlier. A new report by the American Lung Association shows how polluted air continues to place the health of millions of other Americans in jeopardy.
The lung association’s latest “State of the Air” report—an annual survey of air quality nationwide—found that more than a third of all Americans, or about 131 million people, are living in communities with unhealthy levels of air pollution.
The report also found that from 2020 to 2022 the nation experienced more days with air quality that would be classified by the association as hazardous than at any other time over the past quarter century.
While acknowledging the efficacy of a series of clean-air measures that have been enacted over the past 50 years, officials with the association said that the report also underscored how the warming planet continues to worsen levels of unhealthy air.