During today’s United Nations (UN) event “Healthy Indoor Air: A Global Call to Action,” advocate Violet Affleck spoke about how clean air and masking are vital tools to address the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
She also advocated for children with Long COVID, citing a recent JAMA resource that stated the disease affected nearly six million children and was the most common pediatric health problem in the U.S.
“It is neglect of the highest order to look children in the eyes and say, ‘We knew how to protect you, and we didn’t do it,’” she said during the meeting.
“Our present is being stolen right in front of our eyes,” Affleck said. “For adults, the relentless beat of ‘back to normal,’ ignoring, downplaying, and concealing both the prevalence of airborne transmission and the threat of Long COVID manifested in a series of choices. Young people lacked both real choice in the matter and information about what was being chosen for us.”
Earlier this year, Affleck published an article in the Yale Global Health Review about COVID-19 organizing as a model for climate response in Los Angeles. In it, she argued that N95 masking, clean air, universal health care, and paid sick leave could help defeat the COVID-19 pandemic.
The article also discussed COVID-19 mutual aid organizing, including mask blocs and other organizations that distributed free masks to community members during the January wildfires in the greater Los Angeles area.
Concluding her speech at the UN today, Affleck stated, “We can recognize filtered air as a human right as intuitively as we do filtered water.”
“We can create clean air infrastructure that is so ubiquitous and so obviously necessary, tomorrow’s children don’t even know why we need it.”
