Over 700,000 Kids in New Jersey Are Breathing Unhealthy Air; New York-Newark Metro Area Worse for Ozone Smog, 12th Worst in U.S., Improves to Passing for Particle Pollution; Philadelphia-Reading-Camde

Today, the American Lung Association released its 27th annual “State of the Air” report, which finds that nearly half of the children in the U.S. are breathing unhealthy levels of air pollution—including over 706,882 children in New Jersey—as communities across the state experienced both worsening smog conditions and selective improvements in particle pollution.

The report finds that the New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA metro area, including 13 New Jersey counties, earned an F for ozone smog as it worsened for a third report in a row, placing it as 12th worst in the nation, and worst in the U.S. east of Texas. Meanwhile, the Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD metro area, including seven New Jersey counties, again worsened and failed for the year-round measure of fine particle pollution, dropping its rank from 26th to 17th worst in the country. Except for residents of Warren County, all New Jerseyans live in a metro area ranking among the nation’s worst 25 for a pollutant measure. The New York-Newark metro area posted improvements for both particle measures, enough now to earn a D for the daily measure and to pass for year-round particles. The Philadelphia daily particle measure improved but still fails. 

Parts of the state showed declines, improvements or continued strong performance for certain pollution measures, highlighting air quality contrasts across New Jersey communities. In particular:

• In the four-state New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA metro area that covers almost all the northern part of the state, Mercer and Union Counties tied for worst for the year-round average level of fine particle pollution. Camden County was worst in New Jersey for this measure.
• In the Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD metro area, covering the southern part of the state, Gloucester County, worst in all of New Jersey, tied with Philadelphia County, PA for worst in that four-state area for ozone smog, posting a weighted average of 6.2 unhealthy days per year.
• Atlantic and Camden Counties were worst in the state for the daily (short-term) measure of particle pollution, earning D grades for a weighted yearly average of 2.7 days with unhealthy air. 
• While Camden and Union Counties had failed in last year’s report for the long-term average, now all New Jersey counties graded for fine particle pollution earned passing marks for both the daily and year-round measures. 
• Only one New Jersey county was listed among the cleanest in the country for any measure—Atlantic County, continuing for its third consecutive year with an A grade for ozone smog.

The Lung Association’s “State of the Air” report grades counties’ air quality in terms of unhealthy levels of ground-level ozone air pollution (also known as smog), and year-round and short-term spikes in particle pollution (also known as soot) over a three-year period (2022-2024). The report also ranks counties and metropolitan areas in cleanest and most polluted lists for each pollutant. Ozone and particle pollution can cause premature death and other serious health effects such as asthma attacks, heart attacks and strokes, preterm births and impaired cognitive functioning later in life. Particle pollution can also cause lung cancer.

Infants, children and teens as a group are more susceptible to the health impacts of air pollution. Their lungs are still developing, they breathe more air for their body size than adults and they are frequently exposed to outdoor air. Air pollution exposure in childhood can cause long-term harm, including reduced lung growth, new asthma cases and increased risk of respiratory diseases.

“Clean air is essential to the health and wellbeing of families across New Jersey. Children deserve to breathe air that won’t make them sick,” said Michael Seilback, AVP, nationwide advocacy, state public policy for the American Lung Association. “Unfortunately, too many people across the state, particularly in several of our metro areas, are living with unhealthy levels of ozone and/or particle pollution. This air pollution is causing kids to have asthma attacks, contributing to chronic health conditions, and making people who work outdoors sick.” 

Seilback added: “To compound the issue further, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) rollbacks of critical healthy air rules are impacting our residents. We urge Governor Sherrill and the legislature to take action to improve our air quality, including that the state achieves its climate change goals, increasing solar and wind energy, and moving forward with initiatives to reduce air pollution from energy products, from the transportation sector and from buildings;  and we are calling on everyone to tell EPA that our kids’ health counts.”

Nationally, the report found that 33.5 million children in the U.S., or 46% of people under 18 years old, live in an area that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution. In total, 44% of people of all ages in the U.S. (152 million people in total) live in a county that received a failing grade for at least one measure of air pollution. 32.9 million people live in counties with failing grades for all three measures.

Key Findings for New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA metro area: 
Ground-level Ozone Pollution:  
Ozone “smog” affects the largest number of people in the U.S. Smog forms when gases from tailpipes, smokestacks, factories and other pollution sources react with sunlight. It is a powerful respiratory irritant with effects that have been likened to a sunburn of the lungs.   

• The New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA metro area ranked 12th worst in the nation for ozone pollution. 
  • The ranking was based on the area’s worst county’s average number of unhealthy days—21.2 days per year, an F grade, in Fairfield County, Connecticut. 
  • This was worse than the area's ranking in last year's report of 16th worst, with 20.2 days per year, an F grade.   

Particle Pollution:  
Fine particle pollution can be extremely dangerous and even deadly. These particles come from wildfires, wood-burning stoves, coal-fired power plants, diesel engines and other sources. The report has two grades for particle pollution: one for “short-term” particle pollution, or daily spikes, and one for the annual average “year-round” level that represents the concentration of particles in each location. 

• The New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA metro area ranked 69th worst in the nation for short-term particle pollution. 
  • The ranking was based on the area’s worst county’s average number of unhealthy days—2.8 days per year, a D grade, in Queens County, New York. 
  • This was better than the area's ranking in last year's report of 58th worst, with 3.3 days per year, an F grade.  
• For the year-round average level of particle pollution, the area’s worst counties, Mercer County (last year was incomplete) and Union County (last year failed), New Jersey, received passing grades for the same average pollution levels below the federal standard.  
  • The New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT-PA metro area ranked 78th worst in the nation. 
  • This was better than the area's ranking in last year's report of 48th worst in the nation.  

Key Findings for Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD metro area: 
Ground-level Ozone Pollution:   

• The Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD metro area ranked 43rd worst in the nation for ozone pollution. 
  • The ranking was based on the area’s worst counties’ average number of unhealthy days—6.2 days per year, an F grade, in Gloucester County, NJ and Philadelphia County, PA.
  • The ranking was the same as the area's ranking in last year's report of 43rd worst, but the new average was slightly better than last year’s average of 6.3 days per year, an F grade.   

Particle Pollution:  
Fine particle pollution can be extremely dangerous and even deadly. These particles come from wildfires, The Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD metro area ranked 27th worst in the nation for short-term particle pollution. 

• The ranking was based on the area’s worst county’s average number of unhealthy days—5.3 days per year, an F grade, in Philadelphia County. 
  • This was worse than the area's ranking in last year's report of 30th worst, even though the new result improved from last year’s value of 5.8 days per year, an F grade.   
• For the year-round average level of particle pollution, the area’s worst county, Philadelphia, received a failing grade for pollution levels above the federal standard.  
  • The Philadelphia-Reading-Camden, PA-NJ-DE-MD metro area ranked 17th worst in the nation. 
  • This was worse than the area's ranking in last year's report of 26th worst in the nation.

Warren County, NJ is part of the Allentown-Bethlehem-East Stroudsburg, PA-NJ metro area which showed its best-ever performance for year-round particle pollution, improving from 103rd to 110th worst nationally and continuing to earn a passing grade. Daily particle pollution remained an F despite a slight ranking improvement (50th to 52nd worst), while ozone pollution also improved (105th to 125th worst) but continues to receive only a C grade. Warren County itself worsened to a B for ozone smog after three reports in a row with A grades. For particle pollution, it retained its D grade for the daily measure but improved to its second best performance ever for the year-round average. 

The Lung Association is calling on everyone to urge EPA to value the health of America’s kids. Historically, EPA has played an essential role in protecting people’s health from air pollution. The current EPA has retreated from its public health foundation by rolling back clean air protections. This EPA has also taken the recent step of eliminating health-related information from its economic analyses, meaning that the costs of pollution to kids, families and communities will not be counted as policies are undone. EPA must not devalue kids’ health.

See the full report results and take action at Lung.org/sota.