How do environmental justice issues affect Hartford?
The causes of asthma are not thoroughly understood, but it is known that inherited factors and environment both play a role. Many of the factors that may trigger asthma attacks are related to outdoor air pollution and to poor housing quality, such as dust mites, cockroaches, mold, and mildew. Asthma is widely considered an epidemic in the United States today. Asthma rates are rising for all age groups, within and outside urban areas, regardless of race, income, and region of the country. Hartfords rates are alarmingly high. In summer 2000, the Hartford City Council declared an “asthma emergency” in the city.
