New insights into air pollution and children’s health

Abstract

Air pollution remains a major threat to children’s health. In high-income countries, most outdoor air pollution is from fossil fuel combustion, and most indoor pollution is from cooking and environmental tobacco smoke (ETS). Outdoor pollution in medium- and low-income countries is a mix of fossil-fuel, solid fuel (e.g. coal) and biomass (wood), and indoor pollution is from biomass smoke, solid fuels and ETS. Over the last decade, new data suggest that both biomass smoke and ETS increases the vulnerability of children to bacterial pneumonia, and that fossil-fuel and biomass smoke impair children’s neurocognitive development. Further research is needed to establish biological plausibility for these associations.