As the American West faces increasing air pollution, protecting the right to mask is vital

About twenty miles west of downtown Salt Lake City, Utah, the southern edge of Great Salt Lake is usually visible from an elevated spot overlooking the valley. Year-round air pollution, however, can often cloud visibility, a fitting image that portends the lake’s potential fate. 

A 2023 scientific study found that, without drastic action, the Great Salt Lake would dry up within five years, creating another major source of air pollution that could impact the entire region.

As the Great Salt Lake evaporates, toxic metals like arsenic, copper, and lead from the lake bed become exposed to the air, where they can travel across the populous Salt Lake Valley and possibly thousands of miles away. High winds are already causing dangerous dust storms, which have been shown to disproportionately impact neighborhoods of color. When inhaled, these metals irritate the lungs, causing short-term and long-term health complications such as cardiovascular disease and asthma. 

Despite the state already experiencing some of the worst air quality in the country, and a high rate of Long COVID, the Utah Legislature proposed criminalizing masks in January, following a wave of similar legislation that has spread across the country since summer 2024. The bill would have banned masks in a variety of indoor and outdoor spaces, without any health exemptions.

“Sometimes I mask outside because the air quality is bad, which makes my symptoms worse,” said Sav Pearson, an environmental advocate with Long COVID who resisted the proposed ban. “Masks are important for all of us to protect ourselves from the state’s negligent approach to [that air pollution] and its failure to mitigate industrial harm.” The Utah Division of Air Quality lacks a comprehensive system for monitoring these events or providing air quality alerts.

Recognizing masks as an important tool for Utahns to protect themselves from pollution as well as COVID-19, community members flooded their legislators’ communication lines. The mask ban language was removed from the bill before the committee could even discuss it.

This win against Utah’s proposed mask ban would likely not have been possible without environmental groups joining disability and health justice advocates to protect the right to mask. 

“It’s the most fundamental freedom one could think of — altering your behavior to protect your own health,” said Brian Moench, executive director of Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment, one of the organizations that rallied constituents against the bill.

Utah’s proposed ban became an important case study demonstrating the overlapping concerns between airborne pathogens and environmental air pollution. It highlighted the necessity of building coalitions between environmental, health and disability, and civil liberties groups in resisting mask bans as climate change is on track to worsen a variety of environmental public health threats, not just in Utah but across the American West.

Air pollution exacerbates disease risks

Studies show air pollution exposure increases the chances of developing heart, lung, and neurological diseases, including worse outcomes of COVID-19. 

“The pollution [is] compromising the natural defenses of the body to infection, and that leads to more serious infections, or infections that happen that wouldn’t have otherwise happened,” explained Afif El-Hasan, a pediatrician with Kaiser Permanente in Southern California and chair of the American Lung Association’s Public Policy Committee. 

The American Lung Association includes N95 masks in its guidance for protection against air pollution as well as airborne disease. Different types of masks can protect from a wide variety of airborne pollutants, including viruses like SARS-CoV-2, influenza, and measles; wildfire smoke; allergens like dust and mold; and industrial toxins. 

The pollution [is] compromising the natural defenses of the body to infection, and that leads to more serious infections, or infections that happen that wouldn’t have otherwise happened.

Afif El-Hasan, Kaiser Permanente

Air pollution is already a leading cause of premature deaths worldwide. And climate change, along with the Trump administration’s weakening of environmental protections and trust in public health, is on track to worsen this trend, underscoring why mask bans are so dangerous. 

Warmer temperatures mean longer and more intense pollen seasons and worsening allergies, and drier and hotter conditions generally are also linked to more particulate matter kicked up by dust. Disturbed soil — such as for new developments — and erratic weather patterns can also create ideal conditions for previously dormant pathogens to spread, such as the fungi Coccidioides, which can cause Valley Fever. The disease has been on the rise in several Western states — but N95s provide protection against the fungal spores. 

“As the climate crisis continues to accelerate and we keep burning even more and more fossil fuels, then the right to wear masks becomes an even greater imperative, and any prohibition on that right becomes even more of an outrage,” Moench said.

Wildfires threaten air quality

One of the biggest air pollution threats to the Western region is wildfires, as climate change makes wildfire season longer and more intense. 

For Laura, a public school teacher in California who grew up with asthma and mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS) and now has Long COVID, the connections between COVID-19 safety and air quality are very clear. (Laura requested to use only her first name to avoid repercussions from her employer.)

“I grew up in Sacramento County, and they burned fields there every year for a long time, and so there would be weeks at a time in the fall where I couldn’t go to school, I couldn’t go out of the house,” she said, referring to the now-regulated practice of clearing agricultural fields after harvest by burning off leftover plants. Her parents had HEPA air filters when she was growing up in the 1970s, before they became more widespread. 

While she didn’t use masks growing up, she started to bring them with her to work before the COVID-19 pandemic. During one pre-2020 wildfire, she found an N95 to be effective and handed them out to other teachers.

Now, facing the high risk of COVID-19 exposure in a public school setting, in addition to wildfires, she wears her mask all day, and also tries to keep the classroom windows open while running portable air purifiers. Knowing that high CO₂ levels are linked to difficulty concentrating as well as higher risk of infection, she also invested in a CO₂ monitor. 

While many tools to prevent air pollution and airborne pathogens overlap, they are not identical. For example, different masks are designed for different pollutants. And opening windows to stay safe from pathogens like SARS-CoV-2 is not a good option if a wildfire has recently occurred. In those cases, masks become even more vital as a tool for individuals to protect themselves when infrastructure cannot.

“The more the climate crisis evolves, the more wildfires we have … the more a ban on masks becomes an absurdity and an assault on public health,” said Moench.

The more the climate crisis evolves, the more wildfires we have … the more a ban on masks becomes an absurdity and an assault on public health.

Brian Moench, Utah Physicians for a Healthy Environment

Chemical fires introduce other dangerous pollutants

In addition to climate change increasing the chances of acute environmental disasters like wildfires or floods, these disasters can also damage industrial facilities, leading to chemical fires or otherwise bringing other dangerous contaminants into the air. 

This combination of fires threatened Gwendolyn Hill, one of many Californians with Long COVID who had to navigate the threats of wildfire smoke and airborne disease when the Eaton fire broke out in January. 

Hill was lucky to have enough time to pack air filters and masks before she evacuated to her friends’ parents’ house south of Los Angeles. The house had separate rooms, and she and her friends masked inside. Yet in Red Cross shelters where other evacuees gathered, COVID-19 mitigations were hardly considered.

When she relocated to the Bay Area to wait out the worst of Southern California’s smoke, she had to confront yet another airborne threat: on January 16, ten days after the Eaton fires began, a different fire broke out at the Vistra Energy power plant near Santa Cruz, one of the largest battery storage facilities in the world. Burning lithium batteries emitted hydrogen fluoride, a toxic gas. Even though the EPA’s monitoring did not find hydrogen fluoride levels it deemed unsafe for the public, Hill could feel the effects from miles away.

“If I didn’t wear my P100, specifically with the vapor cartridges, then my throat would burn and my eyes would be stinging,” they said. A P100 is a type of reusable respirator that can use a variety of cartridges or filters to protect from gases and vapors in addition to particle pollution.

If I didn’t wear my P100, specifically with the vapor cartridges, then my throat would burn and my eyes would be stinging.

Gwendolyn Hill, californian with long covid, on pollution from chemical fires

While Hill regularly wears N95s, she had to do her own research on what types of masks could keep her safe from chemical fires as she couldn’t easily find that information from public health authorities at the time.

Wildfires and chemical fires create a variety of pollutants depending on the material that is burned, including fine particulate matter and volatile organic compounds (VOCs). When fires burn industrial structures like homes or buildings, they can release toxic substances like benzene and heavy metals. In addition, wildfire smoke can create even smaller particulates called PM2.5. The finer the particle, the farther it can be transported by wind — and the deeper it can penetrate into the lungs, causing worse damage.

N95s protect from airborne viruses like SARS-CoV-2 and from PM2.5 particulate matter, but not from VOCs like hydrogen fluoride or other gases. When more protection is necessary — one way to tell is that VOCs emit chemical odors — use a respirator like the P100 with a multi-gas and particulate filter. In the U.S., respirators should be certified by the National Institutes for Occupational Safety and Health. 

Each of these masks will fit differently for different people. Aaron Collins, a mechanical engineer with a background in aerosol science known for his “Mask Nerd” videos about different types of masks, stresses that while not all masks protect from all contaminants, the best mask is the one that fits best to avoid leakage.

Importantly, air pollution can linger for several weeks even after a wildfire or chemical fire is extinguished, so it is important to keep masking after an air pollution event has ended, and monitor agency reporting.

Resisting mask bans

Along with Utah, legislators in California and Texas — both also states with a track record of poor air quality as well as ongoing COVID-19 spread — recently proposed or considered anti-mask policies. Other Western states have historic anti-mask laws that could be newly invoked, including Arizona, California, and New Mexico. 

Many mask blocs and other COVID-19 justice organizations readily see this connection between COVID-19, air pollution, and masks, and have been raising awareness about this overlap.

In February, Tucson Mask Bloc donated 1,500 masks to the Navajo Nation, whose members are exposed to significant amounts of dust pollution from trucks transporting dangerous uranium waste.

“Our mutual aid goes beyond infection prevention — we also support people who are protecting themselves from pollution and environmental racism,” their post about the donation read. 

Our mutual aid goes beyond infection prevention — we also support people who are protecting themselves from pollution and environmental racism.

Tucson Mask Bloc

In the spring, as concerns rose about Mt. Spurr — a volcano 80 miles west of Anchorage — erupting, Alaska Mask Bloc distributed more than 1,200 masks, organizers told The Sick Times. The group also helped to spread the word that masks are an important form of protection against the harmful particulates distributed by eruptions. Although the risk of eruption has since waned, the group says this was an important opportunity to connect the dots between masking, COVID-19, and air pollution.

“If we can get people comfortable with the idea of using respirators to protect themselves from visible environmental hazards, it won’t be too much of a stretch for them to wear it in order to protect themselves from respiratory disease,” Kristine, an Alaska Mask Bloc organizer who asked to use only her first name to avoid repercussions from her employer, said.

While the Western region is known for poor air quality, the past few years especially have shown how wildfire smoke can spread hundreds of miles away from its source, impacting wide swaths of the country. In late July, for example, Canadian wildfires blanketed much of the Midwest and Northeast in hazardous air quality. No matter where we live in the world, our air will be impacted by the climate crisis, making masks a vital everyday tool to stay safe. 

“I think there’s so much potential for joining forces,” Maria Gillespie, founder of Mask Together Colorado, said. “It’s all about what we’re breathing, and honestly, it’s just a human thing. We need clean air to breathe. That should be a human right.”

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Amelia Diehl is a writer and journalist in Salt Lake City, Utah, and the coproducer of Stay Salty: Lakefacing Stories, a podcast about Great Salt Lake. Her writing has appeared in In These Times, Yes! Magazine, Belt Magazine, Salt Lake City Weekly, and elsewhere. Her Substack Context Collapse covers climate, COVID-19, and culture. 

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