Air pollution is one of the most urgent and underrecognized threats to child health in the world today. According to a landmark report from the World Health Organization, 93 percent of the world’s children under the age of 15, approximately 1.8 billion children, breathe air so polluted it puts their health and development at serious risk every single day. In 2016 alone, an estimated 600,000 children died from acute lower respiratory infections caused by polluted air.
These are not abstract statistics. Air pollution is actively damaging children’s brains, lungs, and long term health outcomes, and the burden falls most heavily on children in low and middle income countries where regulatory protections are weakest.
Why Children Are Especially Vulnerable to Air Pollution
Children are not simply small adults when it comes to air pollution exposure. Their bodies and brains are still developing, which makes them far more susceptible to the damaging effects of pollutants than adults.
One key reason is that children breathe more rapidly than adults, meaning they absorb a greater volume of pollutants relative to their body size. They also spend more time closer to the ground, where certain pollutants reach their highest concentrations. Newborns and young children are additionally at greater risk from household air pollution produced by cooking, heating, and lighting with polluting fuels and technologies.
The developmental window of early childhood, when the brain and respiratory system are growing fastest, is precisely when air pollution does the most harm.
What Air Pollution Does to a Child’s Health
The WHO report on Air Pollution and Child Health reveals a wide range of serious health consequences tied to both ambient (outdoor) and household air pollution exposure in children.
Neurodevelopment and cognitive function: Air pollution negatively affects brain development, leading to lower cognitive test scores and impaired mental and motor development in children who are regularly exposed to high levels of pollutants.
Lung function: Even at lower levels of exposure, air pollution damages children’s lung function in ways that can have lasting consequences into adulthood.
Respiratory infections: Household and outdoor air pollution together cause more than 50 percent of acute lower respiratory infections in children under 5 in low and middle income countries.
Chronic disease risk: Children exposed to high levels of air pollution may face a significantly greater risk of cardiovascular disease and other chronic conditions later in life.
Cancer and asthma: Air pollution can trigger asthma and has been linked to childhood cancer in some populations.
Premature birth and low birth weight: Pregnant women exposed to polluted air are more likely to give birth prematurely and to have babies with low birth weight, compounding the health risks from the earliest moments of life.
The Scale of the Crisis: Key Findings from the WHO Report
The numbers in the WHO report are staggering and demand urgent attention from policymakers, health systems, and the research community alike.
Globally, 93 percent of all children under 15 are exposed to ambient fine particulate matter (PM2.5) levels above WHO air quality guidelines. This includes 630 million children under the age of 5. In low and middle income countries, the figure rises to 98 percent of all children under 5. Even in high income countries, 52 percent of children under 5 are exposed to PM2.5 levels above safe thresholds.
More than 40 percent of the global population, including 1 billion children under 15, is exposed to high levels of household air pollution from cooking with polluting technologies and fuels. Air pollution now accounts for almost 1 in 10 deaths in children under five years of age, making it one of the leading environmental threats to child survival worldwide.
What Must Change: WHO Recommendations
The WHO report was released in advance of the organization’s first ever Global Conference on Air Pollution and Health, held in Geneva in October 2018. The conference called on world leaders, health ministers, and environmental policymakers to commit to concrete actions against air pollution.
Key recommendations include accelerating the transition away from fossil fuels in the global energy mix, investing in renewable energy and energy efficient housing, improving waste management to reduce open burning, and promoting cleaner transportation systems. Schools and playgrounds should be located away from major pollution sources such as busy roads, factories, and power plants.
At the household level, exclusive use of clean cooking and heating technologies can dramatically improve indoor air quality and reduce the respiratory disease burden on children and families.
“Air pollution is stunting our children’s brains, affecting their health in more ways than we suspected,” said Dr. Maria Neira, Director of Public Health at WHO. “But there are many straightforward ways to reduce emissions of dangerous pollutants.”
Air Pollution, Respiratory Disease, and the Role of Clinical Research
The health consequences of air pollution create a growing need for clinical research into respiratory conditions, neurodevelopmental disorders, cardiovascular disease, and childhood cancer. Understanding how environmental exposures drive disease is essential to developing the next generation of treatments and preventive interventions.
FOMAT Medical Research supports Phase I through Phase IV clinical trials across therapeutic areas that intersect directly with the health effects of air pollution, including infectious diseases and respiratory conditions. Our national network of community based investigators is experienced in reaching diverse and underserved populations who carry a disproportionate burden of environmentally driven disease. Contact our team to learn how FOMAT can support your next study.
Source: World Health Organization