How clean air clubs are protecting Americans from wildfire smoke
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- Emily Dupree launched the first clean air club in Chicago during Covid, lending air purifiers to touring musicians; the network has since grown to over 40 clubs worldwide with Dupree creating a Google doc to help others start their own.
- Mendo Clean Air Club organizer Miquette Thompson says her Mendocino County health department failed to distinguish N95 masks (better at filtering tiny particles) from less effective cloth or surgical options for wildfire smoke.
- Mask Bloc Los Angeles distributed more than 300,000 masks in two weeks during the catastrophic January 2025 LA fires.
- Hospitalizations for asthma rise 10% on smoke days according to a recent University of California study cited in the article.
- Mask Bloc Delaware, launched in 2024 by Shannon and Jimmy Durkin, distributed PPE in July as smoke from Canadian wildfires reached the east coast; Shannon, who has cystic fibrosis, said she felt "excised from public life" after Biden declared the Covid emergency "over" in 2023.
- Organizers say the work has grown more necessary as the current administration casts doubt on masks and the severity of Covid, which killed more than 350,000 Americans in 2020.
Why it matters: With asthma hospitalizations jumping 10% on smoke days and federal public health guidance retreating, volunteer networks are filling a gap local health departments can't — Mask Bloc LA distributed over 300,000 masks in two weeks alone, pivoting Covid-era mutual aid infrastructure toward climate-driven wildfire threats.
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