Pollution linked to first time asthma in children, study says - Cinziamorini
There are limitations to the study, since it is observational and relies on a model, and didn’t look at children’s specific personal exposure to pollution. There’s an underlying assumption that children spent the majority of the time in the area of their residential address.
Personal air monitoring may add more detail to an assessment like this. There may also be other risk factors that couldn’t be captured by the data since it lacked individual level information.
Exposure to pollution is also linked to heart problems, cancer, and premature death. And it’s not just physical problems.
A 2019 study found that even short-term exposure to high ambient air pollution corresponded with a rise in visits to the children’s psychiatric emergency department for adjustment disorder, suicidal thoughts, and schizophrenia.
This isn’t a problem isolated to Denmark. According to the World Health Organization, around 93% of the world’s children breathe air that is so polluted it puts their health and development at serious risk.
That’s higher than was found in past reports. Scientists think the climate crisis is making it even harder to protect human health, since warmer temperatures make air pollution a much bigger problem.