Air pollution and health: How will our children continue to breathe?

How will our children continue to breathe?

Children are our future.

Societies that help their children to achieve their full potential thrive and grow economically.

That's why it's so important to protect our children from one of the greatest dangers they face: the toxins and particles in polluted air.

Children, our future, crave clean air so they can survive and thrive.

Our future craves clean air but...

air pollution is increasing.

We are facing an emergency: 9 out of 10 children do not breathe safe air.

Children are closer to the ground, to car exhausts and indoor smoke.

They breathe faster than adults, taking in more of the polluted air.

And their developing bodies are more likely to be damaged by the toxins in the air.

Every year 600,000 children die from breathing polluted air.

Before a baby takes her first breath she's being harmed by the toxins her mother is inhaling.

Half of all deaths from lung infection in young children in low and middle-income countries are due to air pollution.

If that baby survives childhood the daily damage done to her brain, lungs, heart will limit her chances of growing into a healthy productive adult.

Cognitive damage lowering of a child's ability to learn means children exposed to air pollution will struggle at school and fail to reach their full potential.

Terrible damage has been done but it is still not too late to change.

By prescribing clean air for children, policymakers can save lives and protect them from the lifelong effects of air pollution exposure.

We all have a role to play: activists, experts, economic and political leaders and individuals can all take steps to better manage waste, change the way we travel, monitor air quality and regulate production of pollutants among many other potential actions.

But we have no time to waste.

We can and we must act now.

Organisation mondiale de la santé