Indoor air pollution in homes and schools increases the danger of women and children developing respiratory disorder. The general air pollutants include smoke, soot, pollen, carbon dioxide, methane, and mold. The inhalation of the particles in air leads to the death of a high number of people worldwide. Air contamination resulted in early deaths of approximately 4.2 million in 2016 (Levasseur, Poulin, Campagna, & Leclerc, 2017). Often, indoor air pollution is associated with a high rate of respiratory diseases, health diseases, cancer, and stroke. Over 40% of the American population (134 million people) are at risk of infection and premature deaths due to air pollution (Upadhyay, Singh, Kumar, & Singh, 2014). The American Clean Air Act (CAA) established in 1970 was meant to protect Americans from developing health-related issues as a result of air pollution. Mainly, the act addresses problems relating to Sulphur, oxides, hydrocarbons, and nitrates.
The policy, which is nationwide in the United States has been adopted by several states to regulate air pollution both in domestic and industrial settings. However, the plan is ineffective due to the omission of indoor pollution. As a result it focuses on the wrong pollutants hence the lack of adequate understanding of the pollution chemistry. The risk of air pollution continues to affect people. Women and kids are the most impacted by the indoor air contamination due to the long hours spent indoors. Usually, 90% of the working hours of women is conducted indoors while most of the children either spend time with their mothers in houses or classrooms (Teleszewski & Gładyszewska-Fiedoruk, 2018). For that reason, there is an increasing risk of developing respiratory diseases and other allergic disorders such as asthma due to pollutants released from dust mites, pests, and cleaning materials used in a home.
Delegate your assignment to our experts and they will do the rest.
Problem Statement
Besides the current sources of indoor pollution like poorly ventilated houses and classrooms, there are also passive causes such as tobacco smoke from cigarettes. Usually, the smoke inhaled by passive smokers is more carcinogenic than the normal smoke huffed by actual smokers. According to the World Health Organization (2010), approximately 1.5 million early deaths per year are directly associated with indoor air contamination from soot and smoke released by solid fuel. More than half of the 4,000 deaths occur due to air pollution in residences are children.
Usually, children are considered the most vulnerable from the impact of indoor air pollution. At a young age, children have a higher resting rate and oxygen consumption because of their rapid growth. Children also have a narrow airway that causes a small irritation that would result in adverse effects on children. Women suffer from indoor pollution due to all the cooking activities and the use of biomass for domestic operations and warming the houses. Household air pollution results in noncumulative illnesses like stroke, ischemic heart disease, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and lung cancer.
A pproximately three billion people continue to cook using solid fuel especially among the poor and middle –income families ( Dutta & Banerjee, 2014). Soot from the cooking activities as well as poorly ventilated houses results in a higher level of pollutants in the air beyond the accepted and allowed by the Clean Air Act (CAA) (World Health Organization, 2010). Exposure to indoor fuel increases the chances of women developing the chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) than those consuming clean energy and other technologies. Generally, the pollutants lead to the inflammation of the airway and lungs thus reducing ability of the blood to distribute oxygen in the body.
Recommendations
There is a need for coordination between the policymakers and the housing stakeholders to achieve a healthy environment with minimal indoors pollution. First and foremost, it is necessary for indoor air pollution to be included in the clean air pollution policy. With the high number of adverse effects it has on women and children, it is impossible to ignore and consider it insignificant. It is necessary for the lawmakers to equate the implications in terms of the direct and indirect cost on people. Again, the cost and benefits of obtaining a clean air environment should also be monetarized to allow the stakeholders and lawmakers to understand the importance of ensuring fresh air use. A law should be put in place to govern the department of housing on effective housing interventions. The old windows that give inefficient are circulation should be replaced with efficient ones. Replacement of windows also acts as a way of ensuring control of the lead dust and hazards resulting from lead paints (Levasseur et al., 2017). Also, the introduction of economic incentives and health benefits associated with attaining the given housing standards should be established.
Lastly, the policy should establish a law for nurses and other social workers to create awareness on clean air through education programs. Medical practitioners should ensure a proper understanding of the benefits of living in the right house before people make decisions to acquire an incentive for the same. Additionally, the policy should incorporate the work of other programs such as the EPA’s Energy Star plus Indoor Air and Enterprise Foundations Green Communities to ensure that people get adequate education on the benefits of indoor clean air, especially about their health.
Effects on Health Care Service Provision
With the prevalence of indoor air pollution, cases of respiratory diseases have raised leading to an increase in the number of individuals seeking intensive medical care. Health care facilities have become overburdened with the number of people particularly women and children suffering from breathing disorder and asthma requires effective and quick responses (Teleszewski & Gładyszewska- Fiedoruk, 2018). Generally, people are spending more money to obtain health services for the conditions that can be avoided.
References
Dutta, S., & Banerjee, S. (2014). Exposure to indoor air pollution & women health: the situation in urban India. Environment and Urbanization A sia, 5 (1), 131-145.
Levasseur, M. E., Poulin, P., Campagna, C., & Leclerc, J. M. (2017). Integrated management of residential indoor air quality: A call for stakeholders in a changing climate. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health , 14 (12), 1455.
Teleszewski, T., & Gładyszewska-Fiedoruk, K. (2018). Changes in carbon dioxide concentrations in classrooms: simplified model and experimental verification. Pol. J. Environ. Stud , 27 (5), 1-7.
Upadhyay, A. K., Singh, A., Kumar, K., & Singh, A. (2015). Impact of indoor air pollution from the use of solid fuels on the incidence of life threatening respiratory illnesses in children in India. BMC public health , 15 (1), 300.
World Health Organization. (2010). WHO guidelines for indoor air quality: selected pollutants.
