“This year is my first year celebrating Children’s Health Month as a grandmother,” writes Almeta Cooper in an op-ed published this week in Word in Black. “My grandson was born in August, and as all new grandmothers know, loving a grandchild renews your love for children in a way that nothing else can.”
This is the third October that Almeta and Moms Clean Air Force have partnered with the Children’s Environmental Health Network (CEHN) and the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) to honor Children’s Health Month, a time to raise awareness about children’s unique health needs. This work, which Moms is dedicated to year-round, is especially important to Almeta because she knows, “Black children like my grandson and those children in low-income families are most likely to suffer from the health impacts of extreme weather and pollution.”
Tell Congress: Defend EPA’s Ability to Protect Human Health and the Environment
Children’s still-developing bodies, behavioral patterns, and social environments make them particularly vulnerable to the threats of climate change and air pollution. Children living in communities near industrial facilities, highways, and other major pollution sources—which are often communities of color—are even more at risk. The U.S. has been working to clean up our air for decades since Congress passed the Clean Air Act, and yet still, Almeta writes, “millions of children are breathing unhealthy levels of pollution generated by fossil-fueled vehicles, power plants, oil and gas operations, and increasingly intense wildfire smoke.”
She goes on to remind us that “air pollution and the climate crisis are inextricably linked. Greenhouse gases heat the climate, leading to extreme temperatures and conditions that intensify wildfires, which in turn increase local soot and ozone air pollution. It’s a terrible cycle.”
And it seems this cycle won’t be broken any time soon. President Trump and EPA Administrator Lee “Pollution Spree” Zeldin are rolling back as many pollution protections as they can and clawing back funding for clean energy projects that Congress had already allocated. They are turning back the clock, trying to push us closer to a time before Clean Air Act protections. “Candidly,” Almeta writes, “I am tempted to succumb to feeling hopeless and overwhelmed. Fortunately, I am neither alone nor powerless. I am joined by the 1.6 million members of Moms Clean Air Force and other organizations that share the same mission and goals.”
In the lead-up to Children’s Health Month 2025, Almeta worked to build the power of her community, cohosting training sessions with CEHN and EDF to prepare dozens of caregivers and young people to become Child Health Champions. Training participants learned how to use their personal stories to advocate for strong environmental health protections at the local and state levels. Some of them even got their mayors and governors to officially proclaim October 9 Children’s Environmental Health Day.
“Joining together with others in collective action strengthens my commitment and resolve,” Almeta writes. She wants to challenge every mom, dad, caregiver, and person who loves children to demand that our government support “preserving the planet as a place where every child can enjoy the human rights of clean air to breathe, clean water to drink, and a healthy neighborhood to live in.”
Read the op-ed on Word in Black.
Tell Congress: Defend EPA’s Ability to Protect Human Health and the Environment