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Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 2005;159:786.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

Last December, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) disclosed a list of counties across the nation that have had persistently unsafe levels of a specific kind of air pollution known as PM 2.5. PM 2.5 refers to air particles, made from a hodgepodge of metals, organic compounds, and other substances produced primarily from the combustion of fossil fuels, that are all less than 2.5 µm (or about one thirtieth the width of a human hair). About 95 million Americans (that’s roughly 1 in 3) breathe air deemed to be consistently higher than the EPA’s PM 2.5 air quality standards.¹

Despite the lack of press, this is big news. Here is why: no component of air pollution poses a greater threat to our health than PM 2.5. Because of its small size, it navigates to the deepest reaches of our lungs and precipitates both local and systemic inflammation. Short-term exposure to elevated . . . [Full Text of this Article]

AUTHOR INFORMATION

Aaron S. Bernstein, MD; Herbert T. Abelson, MD