Use and Care Manual

Why better indoor air quality means better health
Helping customers understand the important reasons to
improve ventilation
Whether you are building a new home, renovating an existing one, or fixing
a problem like a leaky roof or wet basement, helping your customers
understand the importance of proper ventilation and clean air will not only
help them enjoy their home more, it can have long-term benefits for their
health. What they don’t see, i.e., the indoor air they breathe every day, is
just as vital as what they do see.
Poor indoor air quality ranked one of top five
environmental risks.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has ranked poor indoor air
quality among the top five factors of environmental risk, saying “the
potential impact of indoor air quality on human health nationally can be
considerable for several reasons.”
As part of the EPA's report on Indoor Air Quality (IAQ), they identify three
key factors:
1. Americans, on average, spend approximately 90 percent of
their time indoors, where the concentrations of some pollutants
are often 2 to 5 times higher than typical outdoor concentrations.
2. People who are often most susceptible to the adverse effects
of pollution (e.g., the very young, older adults, people with
cardiovascular or respiratory disease) tend to spend even more
time indoors.