Freedom to breathe

Breathing clean air is vital to help children realise their full potential and live long healthy lives, yet access to clean air is not included among children’s rights as defined by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC).

We successfully empowered young people across the globe to claim their right to breathe clean air through the Freedom to Breathe campaign. 

The Freedom to breathe campaign - run by Blueair in partnership with Global Action Plan, Association for the Promotion of Youth Leadership Advocacy and Volunteerism Cameroon (APYLAV), Centre for Environment Education, Coalition for Clean Air, and Safekids Worldwide provided an opportunity for children to call for their right to clean air to be acknowledge by the UNCRC.

Providing a platform for children’s voices 

The Freedom to Breathe campaign began in 2021 when our research demonstrated that children worldwide were worried about air pollution and wanted their right to clean air recognised by the United Nations. We knew we needed to provide a platform for their voices to be heard.

It is vital that we protect children from air pollution. Nine out of ten children around the world are breathing in toxins that exceed safe levels, which can interfere with critical stages of organ development in a child. Children are more physiologically vulnerable to air pollution based on their smaller relative size and they have greater exposure to air pollution based on their relative faster breathing rate, per unit of body weight, compared to adults.  

 

UNICEF predicts that by 2050, air pollution will become the leading cause of child mortality, and the World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that in 2016 alone, 600,000 children died from acute lower respiratory infections caused by polluted air.  

 

The campaign worked with partners across the world to deliver a curriculum-linked education programme that helped young people understand the state of air quality in their cities, the health harms of poor air quality, and simple measures they could take at home and in school to protect themselves from breathing harmful pollutants.     

 

Through this programme, children became empowered to call for their right to clean air, with the support of their teachers. The programme has now been adapted to provide ongoing opportunities for children to learn about the impacts of clean air and how they can call upon decision makers to ask for their right to clean air to be realised and upheld.  

Demanding a child’s right to clean air 

Ahead of World Children’s Day 2021, over 29,000 children from the UK, Cameroon, China, India and the US demanded their right to clean air through the Freedom to breathe campaign.    

 

The children’s calls were captured in this film, which went on to receive a ‘Special Mention from the Jury’ by the World Health Organization at the Health for All Film Festival. 

The children were supported by 62 signatories comprised of civil society organisations, academics and businesses, including UNICEF UK, Great Ormond Street Hospital, Unilever, Global Alliance on Health and Pollution, Professor Sir Stephen Holgate (air pollution expert) and Professor Jonathan Grigg (paediatric health expert). In a letter penned to members of the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child, signatories declared their support for children’s right to clean air being elevated within the Convention.

On World Children’s Day 2021, the Committee Vice-Chair, Philip D Jaffé, responded to the children’s calls at a Freedom to breathe event, saying “We need an air quality revolution”.

Consulting on official UN guidance

In 2022, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child created a General Comment on Children’s Rights and the Environment with a Special Focus on Climate Change (General Comment No 26). This would become the official UN guidance on how children’s rights are impacted by the environmental crisis and what governments must do to uphold these rights.  

 

In its draft form, General Comment No 26 did not clarify that the ‘right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment’ (s.71) includes the right of children to breathe clean air (s.72).    

 

Many of the children involved in the Freedom to breathe campaign voiced their concerns on air pollution and how it affects their lives by engaging with the formal child-friendly consultation process on General Comment No 26.  

The campaign partners – backed by 15 organisations and 4 experts – also submitted a written response to the consultation. Our main points were:

• All children (up to 18 years) should be protected, rather than a narrow focus on the prevention of deaths in children under five years old. 
• The scope should be broadened to include indoor air pollution more generally, rather than concentrating on household air pollution only. 

After successful campaigning, General Comment No 26 was published in September 2023, recognising children’s right to clean air for the first time.  

 

Hannah Battram, Senior Manager of Clean Air for Children at Global Action Plan, commented:

‘Seeing clean air recognised as a child’s right through General Comment 26 is a fantastic step forward. The efforts of these young people – together with their coalition of supporters and hundreds of other campaigners from around the world – have helped elevate this critical issue and will help protect children from the devastating impacts that air pollution has on their health and wellbeing.’