According to the mist eliminator, nearly one in every five SIDS cases in major metropolitan areas is associated with airborne particle pollution. There is a substantial body of evidence showing that short-term increases of particulate air pollution, even at exposure levels below the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) standards, increase mortality and morbidity rates. Data from historic air pollution episodes in London during the 1950′s and in Mexico City during the 1990′s led to acute increases in infant mortality.
Another study by scientists from the Harvard School of Public Health and the University of Basel in Switzerland revealed that almost 3,000 infant deaths per year in the United States may be the result of microscopic airborne particles. The study also concluded that as particulate matter in the air increased, infant mortality rates rose between ten to forty percent. The researchers at UCLA warn parents to be careful about electrostatic air cleaner and young children to both indoor and outdoor air pollution. They caution that while we breathe in gallons of air each day, infants and children are particularly vulnerable to ambient air pollution because their lungs and immune systems are not fully developed and the lungs have a small capacity.
The link between air pollution and infant death has caught the attention of government officials. Just recently, the District of Columbia joined thirteen other states in suing the EPA to strengthen the Electrostaic oil mist collector on the amount of pollution released into the air. The states complain that the EPA has ignored scientific evidence and the advice of its own experts about illness and premature death caused by microscopic air pollution, also known as fine particulate matter.