How to Breathe Better Air

COVID brought breathing into the limelight. The last two and a half years we’ve all been bombarded with fear messaging about a novel respiratory virus that can shut down our lungs.

Humans need to breathe, of course, but instead of worrying about catching an infection from someone else’s exhale, I think our real concern should be the quality of the air we breathe.

Indoor Air Pollution

Most people are spending 90 percent of their time indoors these days, maybe more, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. That’s a problem because pollutant levels in indoor air can be 2 to 5 times higher than outdoor air.

In fact, one study that measured the air and drinking water of 355 residents of New Jersey—a state that’s ignominiously famous for pollution—found indoor air can sometimes be a hundred times more polluted than the air outside. Ugh.

Ironically, the problem of indoor air pollution is exacerbated by energy efficient building techniques.

As we tighten up our homes to make them more energy efficient, we prevent the free exchange of air. While that’s better for the environment and for our utility bills, it can be worse for our lungs and our health.

Air fresheners, asbestos, carbon monoxide, dust from lead paint, those sweet-smelling conventional cleaning products you use, conventional perfume and other scented beauty products, tobacco smoke, gas and wood-burning stoves and fireplaces, pesticides, and mold are just some sources of indoor air pollution.

I hate to break it to you because I know they’re popular, but those odor-eliminating plug-in wall products? They’re actually toxic as fuck.

Why Should We Care About the Air? (Besides being impressed with my rhyming prowess)

Endocrine-disrupting chemicals in the air we breathe and the water we drink have been linked to asthma, birth defects, childhood cancers, and so much more. These toxins are pernicious, slow, and silent killers.

I’ve been reading reports of younger and younger Americans losing their lives to cancer. You’ve probably seen them too.

Just this week, we learned that Pokemon voice actor Billy Kametz died at age 35 from colon cancer.

Last month Kerry O’Riordan McAdam, a business woman and fitness enthusiast, died from breast cancer. McAdam was only 31 years old.

Then there’s Emma Fitzgerald, a young woman in Australia who thought she was getting fat. She was having irregular periods, nausea, and fatigue. Turns out that the weight gain she’s experienced and some excruciatingly painful symptoms are due to ovarian cancer. At age 26!

Overexposure to Toxins

Toxins aren’t just in our indoor air. They’re also in the water, the soil, the food supply, our medications, our clothing, our dental floss (for fuck’s sake), and our so-called preventative medicine (vaccines, anyone?).

While it’s very difficult to establish a definitive one-to-one causatory relationship between any given toxicant and a poor health outcome, the synergistic effect of overexposure to toxins is very real and very worrisome.

So anything we can do to reduce our toxic load is beneficial to both our short and long-term health.

The volatile organic compounds from the homes building materials, glues, furniture, paint, and about a thousand other indoor air pollutants can create toxic air inside your home, school, or office. That’s the bad news.

The good news is that there are some easy ways to reduce your risk of breathing bad air.

1. Grow Green Babies

Indoor houseplants aren’t only beautiful and friendly (and don’t talk back like your kids do, or need to be taken for walks, like your pets), they also provide us humans with a variety of health benefits, as I explain in this recent article about the therapeutic effects of house plants.

(Yes, it’s behind a paywall. You can read it for free if you provide The Epoch Times your email. Or you can send me a private message, and I can email you a free link from the site.)

When I was researching this subject, I was fascinated to find a 2019 study that showed that indoor houseplants are so effective at improving air quality that they help older adults have fewer heart problems. Who knew?

I’m a plant person. But even if you’re not, you can have low-maintenance nice-looking hardy houseplants that are hard to kill. My favorites include all varieties of pothos, philodendrons, and begonias. (Okay, true, begonias aren’t as easy as pothos and philodendrons. But they’re such awesome plants they’re worth learning how to keep alive.)

2. Open Your Windows

Good ventilation improves air quality. As long as you don’t live near a freeway or a power plant, open the windows every day to allow fresh air into your home or place of business. If you can, get into the habit of sleeping with the windows open. The cool breeze will allow more air to circulate in your home and might also help you sleep better.

3. Get Friendly With a Filter

If you do live near the freeway or a coal-burning plant, you probably need an air purifier (or two or five, depending on how big your indoor spaces are). The EPA is not my favorite organization.

(I’m a bit down on government regulatory agencies lately, as you know if you follow this Substack).

But the EPA does offer a helpful guide to home air cleaners and air filters.

4. Do It Yourself (When It Comes to Cleaning Products)

Most traditional cleaners add toxic synthetic chemicals to the indoor air—gross!—even ones that advertise as “clean” or “green.”

You can choose less-toxic cleaners labeled either Green Seal or Environmental Choice but it’s a heck of a lot cheaper and actually non-toxic if you just make your own.

Here’s my my husband’s recipe for DIY laundry detergent. And here's one for DIY counter spray. Share your favorite DIY non-toxic recipe in the comment section below.

5. Wipe Your Sills

Dust can harbor dirt, allergens, and toxic chemicals that are ingested or inhaled by children playing on the floor. So make sure to wipe the surfaces in your home—including window sills and moldings—with a damp cloth every day.

If you live in an older home (built before 1978), you probably have lead paint under the newer paint. When you open and close older windows, you stir up lead paint dust. This is especially bad for small children.

If your home has lead paint, use a detergent that has a chelating agent in it (automatic dish soap contains phosphates which chelate lead) and wipe the sills with disposable paper towels instead of cloth rags. You can find good advice about mitigating lead in the home from this flyer from the Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention Program.

Place a doormat outside and ask everyone in the family and all your visitors to leave their shoes—along with the contaminants they track in—at the door. Also be sure to vacuum your floors and upholstery with a good vacuum cleaner, preferably one with a HEPA filter in it.

Substackers, what have I forgotten? What are your best tips and tricks for improving indoor air quality and breathing clean air? Share your ideas (or chew me out for being vulgar) in the comment section below.

Jennifer Margulis, Ph.D., is an award-winning science journalist and book author. A contributing writer at The Epoch Times, her work has appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, and on the cover of Smithsonian magazine. She is anti-censorship, anti-idiocy, and pro-vibrant good health. She’d include a head shot but she’s having a bad hair day and she can’t figure out how to insert images flush left. Support her independent journalism by becoming a paid subscriber.