To maintain long-term health, monitoring air quality in indoor spaces is crucial.
During the pandemic, disease prevention initiatives such as working-from-home, online school, and quarantine required long hours to be spent inside at home. Shelter-in-place mandates increased the amount of time people spent in indoor spaces, making it necessary to reconsider the quality of indoor air.
Indoor air quality is defined as the quality of the air within indoor environments such as homes, schools, and offices. According to the American Lung Association (ALA), pollutants such as cleaning products, mold, moisture, and household appliance emissions can cause indoor air pollution levels that are two to five times higher than outdoor concentrations.
On average, Americans spend 90 percent of their time indoors, according to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). With how much time people spend inside, the health impacts of prolonged exposure to indoor air are important to recognize. To address the health impacts of poor air quality, in 2023, the Lung Association introduced the “Healthy and Efficient Homes Campaign,” which works to make indoor spaces safer by advancing solutions that improve indoor air quality.
Katherine Pruitt, National Senior Director for the American Lung Association, has worked with a wide range of education and policy perspectives on indoor air quality within the organization for almost 30 years. In her position, she addresses indoor and outdoor air quality and its link to respiratory health. Pruitt is the lead author and editor of the “State of the Air Report,” an annual national report on outdoor air pollution.
“The Lung Association has realized that there is increasing evidence that a key source of indoor air pollution is combustion appliances in the home. After a conducted review of the scientific literature, we now know that pollutants that are released from burning fuel in your home do create conditions that are hazardous to lung health,” according to Pruitt.
The health impact of indoor air pollution
Maintaining healthy indoor air quality is crucial to an individual’s overall health. Various factors can impact indoor air quality such as the use of household cleaning products, mold, moisture, and pests, which can all release dangerous pollutants throughout the home. Appliances such as water heaters and stoves also emit compounds such as nitrogen dioxide, benzene, and carbon monoxide that can be extremely harmful to health.
Exposure to indoor air pollutants is especially dangerous for children and older adults, because these age groups are at higher risk for respiratory issues such as asthma attacks, respiratory tract infections, lung disease, and other harmful diseases.
“There are many types of indoor air pollutants including radon, a naturally occurring radioactive gas that causes lung cancer. The health impacts of each indoor air pollutant vary depending on the source,” said Pruitt. “Health effects include asthma, which is triggered by mold, pests, and allergens, and lung cancer, triggered by exposure to radon. Neurological damage and other potential cancers can also be caused by the volatile organic compounds in cleaning supplies and other products.”
Take action against poor air quality
The focus on reduction of indoor air pollution increased during the asthma epidemic in the 90s, according to a National Library of Medicine. Widespread focus on the issue increased again during the COVID-19 pandemic, when people started to consider the impact of indoor air quality because of increased time spent indoors.
“Having worked on indoor air quality for many years, we saw a big uptick in interest in the topic early in the 1990s and 2000s as the asthma epidemic was peaking. During the COVID-19 pandemic, people started to think about indoor air quality again because it had us all at home all the time and considering what was circulating in the air we were breathing,” said Pruitt.
To protect yourself and your family from the health impacts of indoor air pollution, it is important to take precautions to reduce indoor air pollutants. Actions that can be taken to reduce indoor air contaminants include installing carbon monoxide detectors in the home, avoiding unnecessary wood burning inside, using a vent hood, or opening a window when cooking on a gas stove, and transitioning to healthier and efficient electric appliances, according to the Lung Association. Make sure that all gas appliances within the home work properly. For households that use wood burning for heat and cooking, air cleaning devices that use HEPA filtration can provide some protection from soot and smoke.
“The first thing to do to take action toward better air quality is to be aware of the air in your home. Think about what you are bringing into your home, such as the types of chemicals you are using and what scents and fragrances you’re introducing. Make sure you have a source of fresh air inside the home,” said Pruitt.
Federal, state, and local government agencies can also contribute to improving indoor air quality. Air quality legislation can address issues by introducing appliance safety standards, establishing building codes for ventilation, and transitioning to healthy, all-electric construction in new buildings.
“It’s important to do what we can to improve ventilation in buildings, which can be accomplished by making sure that our building codes are up to date, and that buildings have appliance safety standards,” said Pruitt. “Indoor air quality is key to maintaining public health, and the Lung Association has a wide range of resources available to help families and the public improve indoor air quality.”