Scientists Speak Out for Clean Air

The Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee has blasted the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for failing to adopt standards that limit fine particulate pollution to levels that fully protect the health of our children and our communities.

In a letter sent last week, the Committee, which provides science-based recommendations for how the EPA should protect clean air, stood up for our health. The highlights of the letter include:

• The CASAC [Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee] recommended changes in the annual fine-particle standard because there is clear and convincing scientific evidence that significant adverse human-health effects occur in response to short-term and chronic particulate matter exposures at and below 15 micrograms/m3, the level of the current annual PM [particulate matter] 2.5 standard.

• While there is uncertainty associated with the risk assessment for the PM2.5 standard, this very uncertainty suggests a need for a prudent approach to providing an adequate margin of safety. It is the CASAC's consensus scientific opinion that the decision to retain without change the annual PM2.5 standard does not provide an "adequate margin of safety ... requisite to protect the public health" (as required by the Clean Air Act), leaving parts of the population of this country at significant risk of adverse health effects from exposure to fine PM.

• Significantly, we wish to point out that the CASAC's recommendations were consistent with the mainstream scientific advice that EPA received from virtually every major medical association and public health organization that provided their input to the Agency, including the American Medical Association, the American Thoracic Society, the American Lung Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the American College of Cardiology, the American Heart Association, the American Cancer Society, the American Public Health Association, and the National Association of Local Boards of Health. Indeed, to our knowledge there is no science, medical or public health group that disagrees with this very important aspect of the CASAC's recommendations. EPA's recent "expert elicitation" study only lends additional support to our conclusions concerning the adverse human health effects of PM2.5.

For the sake of the health of our children and our communities, hopefully the EPA will change its mind and adopt scientifically-recommended standards to limit fine particle pollution.