How air pollution and the housing crisis are connected

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As smoke from wildfires from Canada has plagued parts of the United States for a second time this summer, spreading across parts of the Midwest and East Coast, cities have been caught unprepared. While some have issued warnings, the range has been limited.

People walked through the smoke, often with little understanding of the health risks. Once the risks were clarified, some people wore masks to prevent lung damage. But as the smoke and the clear presence of danger receded, they left the masks behind.

It’s easy enough for people who have a place to call home. But for people who are homeless, whether they live in a shelter or on the sidewalk, they often have to navigate confusing rules and regulations to get the kind of help they need.

Additionally, for homeless people, hazardous air isn’t just a threat during an air quality crisis, it’s an everyday occurrence. Homeless people are most at risk, living under motorway overpasses or near industrial estates, meaning their exposure to air pollution is 24/7 and not just for a few days.

In Chicago, homeless people living in green space adjacent to a highway overpass were taken aback by the smoke from the Canadian wildfires. A resident worries how the once-new event may be the latest in a terrifying new normal.

It used to be normal on the west coast and now they have Canadian wildfires up here, now the Midwest will be, like, normalized with wildfires [smoke]said Jared Wilson, 23.

Wilson lives with asthma and has been using an inhaler since he was a child. He describes Chicago’s air as constantly polluted, even before the smoke from the wildfires arrived. A recent analysis by the Guardian placed the city third overall for worst air quality in the United States, primarily due to truck and automobile traffic on the city’s south and west sides.

For Joe Muro, 44, a recent transplant who also lives near the freeway overpass, wildfires are nothing new. He didn’t expect smoke to follow from Colorado, where he experienced the destructive Marshall Fire in the winter of 2021.

According to Muro, volunteers have come to offer masks and water to people living in tents in the area. But he doesn’t remember the Good Samaritans being affiliated with a city agency or partner.

Everything about the air quality crisis has been exacerbated by climate change, from the wildfires themselves to the weather pattern that has blown smoke straight up the East Coast, according to Kristie Ebi, a professor of global health at the University of Washington.

Though the smoke has cleared again, the United States could see another repeat, as long as the fires continue to burn and homeless people are hardest hit, according to advocates.

With any natural disaster, we emphasize that people experiencing homelessness experience it first, experience it worst and generally experience it the longest, said Katie League, head of behavioral health at the National Healthcare for the Homeless Council. Particularly those who live outside all the time, do not have reliable resources.

Highway overpasses or locations adjacent to industrial estates can be safe havens for people experiencing homelessness, as they could provide freedom from displacement or harassment by the police or other residents.

But those places expose vulnerable people to dangerous air pollutants and have little provision to help them deal with health problems that may arise. A 2022 Cleveland Clinic study found that in Visalia, California, more than 60 percent of homeless people surveyed often spent time adjacent to streets where their exposure to particulate matter and other air pollutants was constant. The researchers noted that existing equipment is likely unable to capture the full extent of pollution that people are exposed to when they reside near a road.

One of the major pollutants found in both fire smoke and automobile pollution is called fine particulate matter. PM 2.5, another name for fine particulate matter, is smaller in size than most other types of air pollution, which means it can bypass your body’s defense system. It can burrow deep into your lungs and even get into your bloodstream, causing all kinds of short- and long-term health problems like asthma, COPD, and heart disease down the road.

There is emerging evidence that particulates from fires could be more toxic than particulates from, for example, exhaust gases [pipes]Ebi said.

Air pollutants from wildfire smoke can be more dangerous than normal contaminants because wildfires can burn beyond forests in residential and commercial areas. As these fires burn, they can eliminate nearly everything in their path, including plastics, synthetic fibers, steel components, and other materials. These substances eventually end up in the smoke together with wood particles from the forests, making for a particularly toxic combination.

As the climate crisis intensifies, homeless people could be exposed to even more dangerous conditions with long-term effects. In a 2020 study from the University of Utah, researchers found that nearly 90 percent of people in Salt Lake County experiencing homelessness sought medical help for a condition associated with air pollution.

If the homeless have access to shelter, they often depend on a wide variety of systems that may or may not meet their needs. Shelters might only be open during certain hours or have certain requirements. Furthermore, families may have to separate in order to enter certain shelters, putting parents in a difficult situation.

Other cities have extended shelter hours and distributed masks to try to help people through the crisis. In Philadelphia, the city has opened a shelter in an area where none previously existed. In Baltimore, the city expanded the time people could stay in shelters, as well as coordinatedly reaching out to homeless people through a Mayor’s Office program.

It’s a coordinated response. And so we identify who was at greatest risk, based on their living situation, because they were insecurely housed, as well as people employed by the city who have to work outdoors, said Dr Leticia Dzirasa, deputy mayor for equity, health, and human services in Baltimore.

But part of the problem is a lack of resources to initiate a response when events like these occur, according to Dzirasa.

While air quality in the US has improved dramatically since the 1980s, not everyone benefits. Communities of color are often disproportionately exposed to poor air quality due to decades of racist zoning policies that have disadvantaged non-white and immigrant neighborhoods, often forcing them to live closer to industry.

Similarly, the homeless often find safety from the elements in central high-traffic areas under highway overpasses, which also provide a constant stream of air pollutants. These two issues often affect the same group of people, as Blacks and Latinos are more likely to experience homelessness than their white counterparts.

Planning is key, said Ebi, who noted that any early warning system must include everyone, including the homeless.

Long-term risks, such as vehicular or industrial pollution, also pose an ongoing threat to people’s health. Although there are a number of solutions to limiting exposures, including opening chill centers, expanding access to shelters, and paying for hotels to rent space for people.

There’s only one that’s truly effective for Sean Read, vice president of regional programs at Friendship Place, a Washington, DC-based nonprofit focused on providing services for the homeless.

The answer is: We need more housing, Read said.

This story has been updated to include the correct job title of Sean Read.

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