"Seventy-five percent of the kids lived with smoking parents or they were cooking with gas for nitrogen dioxide particles. So Topeka, Kansas, had as much air pollution that the kids and adults were breathing as a dirty city, because of indoor sources."
"All of a sudden, people were tightening up homes, they were shutting off ventilators for schools to save money. Air pollution indoors got worse, so that those things sort of converge to say this is an important area."
John D. Spengler's career focused on indoor air quality, beginning with the Harvard 'Six Cities' study that revealed high pollution levels from indoor sources. The study found that many children lived with smoking parents or were exposed to nitrogen dioxide from gas cooking. Spengler noted that efforts to improve energy efficiency in homes inadvertently worsened indoor air quality. His work has influenced policies like smoking bans on airplanes and increased awareness of childhood asthma in public housing, highlighting the importance of indoor environments in public health.
Read at Harvard Gazette
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