Asthma and pollution

Asthma is an awful disease - I know, I have it. However, contrary to popular opinion, less pollution does not mean less asthma, even though we hear it confidently stated as fact often enough. While our air in the U.S. is substantially cleaner than it was just a few decades ago, at the same time that our air has been getting cleaner, asthma rates have risen dramatically. In fact, dirtier cities, like Beijing, actually have less asthmatics than cleaner cities like Hong Kong, which has fewer than other, even cleaner cities. Studies, like this one reviewed by author Steve Milloy Smoggy Statistics, that claim a connection between smog and premature deaths are nothing more than a pretext for hyped press releases by the EPA and activists.

As for the smog, I'm all for less smog - who isn't - but not at any cost; it has to be a resonable cost. Draconian laws based on bad science that will not actually accomplish their goal but rather, through the iron-clad law of unintended consequences, make other things worse. That other thing in this case would be the lives of the poor, who would be disproportionately impacted by such energy-restricting policies.