Air pollution is a mixture of solid particles and gases in the air. Car emissions, chemicals from factories, dust, pollen, and mold spores may be suspended as particles. Ozone, a gas, is a major part of air pollution in cities. Both ozone and air pollution have a massive effect on the population of Lawrenceville, Atlanta, and Moore Middle School.
Air pollutions has been proven to cause diseases such as lung diseases, asthma, Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV), Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), Cystic Fibrosis, Carbon Monoxide Poisoning and heart disease. In Georgia, asthma caused more than 51,000 emergency room (ER) visits and 32,000 hospitalizations per year. Sixty-two percent (62%) of school aged children missed at least one or more days of school because of asthma. Twenty-three percent (23%) of adults with current asthma said that they experienced asthma symptoms every day. Asthma affect Georgians economically (e.g. ER visits and hospitalizations) as well as the quality of life for those living with the disease.
Researchers have discovered that air-pollution can do a lot of harm to children's cognitive growth. Shakira Franco Suglia, ScD, an assistant professor at Boston University's School of Public Health, and colleagues followed more than 200 children from birth to an average age of 10. They found that kids exposed to greater levels of black carbon scored worse on tests of memory and verbal and nonverbal IQ (American Journal of Epidemiology, 2008). More recently, Frederica Perera, DrPH, at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, and colleagues followed children in New York City from before birth to age seven. They discovered that children who had been exposed to higher levels of urban air pollutants known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons while in utero were more likely to experience attention problems and symptoms of anxiety and depression (Environmental Health Perspectives, 2012).
According to research by Columbia University scientists, children exposed in the womb to high levels of pollutants in vehicle exhaust had a five times higher risk of attention problems at age 9. The study adds to earlier evidence that mothers' exposures to polycyclic aromatic