Understanding the link between COVID-19 Mortality and Air Pollution

As we mourn and reflect on the more than 300,000 lives that have been lost to COVID-19 in the United States, we can also take stock of what the latest science shows us about the disease. We already know that during this pandemic, people living in areas with unhealthy levels of air pollution are facing multiple threats to their lung health at once. Now, emerging research is shedding light on the links between air pollution and severe illness from COVID-19 -- underscoring the critical need to ensure healthy air for all.

Hazardous Air Pollutants and COVID-19

In a U.S.-based study released in September 2020, researchers at the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry looked at the relationship between chronic exposure to hazardous air pollution and the COVID-19 death rate. Hazardous air pollutants, like formaldehyde, asbestos and mercury, are known or suspected to cause cancer, birth defects, impaired lung function and other serious health harms. These toxic pollutants come from a variety of sources, including coal-fired power plants and other industry, households, vehicles, and wildfires.

The researchers found that an increase in exposure to hazardous air pollutants is associated with a 9% increase in death among patients with COVID-19. They made sure that this increase was really caused by the hazardous air pollutants, not by differences in wealth, other health reasons, or exposure to other types of air pollution. Essentially, the higher the air pollution index, the more it correlated to poor health outcomes due to COVID-19. The likely reason: these pollutants cause respiratory stress, thereby increasing vulnerability to severe illness from COVID-19. 

Source - American Lung Association, 2021