The Clean Air for Kids Program was founded by Stan Brannan (right)
and David Raehpour (to the left) as a corporate sponsored program dedicated to improving the indoor air quality for children in schools and daycares. Medical research reported by the EPA, American Lung Association, Allergy and Asthma Association, American Academy of Pediatrics, New England Journal of Medicing, numerous foreign health service organizations, and the National Education Association document the many detriments of breathing high levels airborne contaminants and prove that poor indoor air quality can have a very negative impact on learning for many children. This glaring need and the lack of funding for schools to help them improve their indoor air quality motivated David and Stan to create a program devoted to aggregating the needs of hundreds or even thousands of schools serving low-income families and then soliciting the needed school funding from corporate sponsors and foundations to provide technology improvements and educational resources to help schools and daycares overcome this important and costly health issue.

Asthma is now the number one chronic illness in children. Claire Barnett, the Executive Director of Health Schools Network states that she feels the poor indoor air quality found in schools may account for up to 50% of the new cases of Asthma in children. Recent studies predict the diagnosis of Asthma can cost more than $100,000 in medical costs by the time the child reaches age 18. In fact, an Asthma rescue inhaler is the number one prescription drug for children in all 50 state Medicaid children's health insurance programs. The National Associations of School Nurses issued a press release declaring that the number of children with Astma symptoms in school could be double the number of students who currently are documented to be stricken with Asthma. The NASN press release stated there is tremendous pressure from worried parents that an Asthma designation by their family doctor will impact their health insurace access and costs, and may even impact their ability to get employment. So children who need Asthma trreatments and observation by school personnel are not getting these important safeguards and the NASN is warning that the crisis of Asthma in schools could be much larger than current statistics indicate.

More school boards are being sued every year over mishandled Asthma attacks by teachers, office staff, school nurses, principals and school volunteers. A small child's Asthma attack needs immediate response with proper medical training and medicines to reduce the risk of serious brain damage or death caused by severly blocked airways triggered by breathing in commonly found allergy triggers. Asthma is not a disease you inherit or catch from someone else. It is simply the eventual outcome of an over burdened immune system trying to handle all of the particulates that stimulate normal bodily immune system responses. The body is trying to expel these toxins and allergens by creating more drainage in the eyes, nose and throat, but the tissue over-reacts and swelling in the airways blocks the ability to take in critical oxygen. The child cannot speak, can barely breathe and may turn blue and pass out in a matter of minutes. Delays in calling the EMTs and an ambulance may mean life and death for a child. These EMT runs and ambulance runs are costly and recent studies showes children in America ride from their school the the Emergency Room more than 385,000 times per year. Just avoiding a few of these Ambulance runs can more than pay for equipping the entire school with classroom air Purifiers.

Asthma is a diagnosis that effectively dissappears if a the triggers are removed. This can as easy as filtering the cat dander and dog dander out of the classroom air. Another critical and cost saving benefit is the child may be able to get off of medications like allergy pills, inhalers and breathing treatments. Many of these antihistamines have know side effects like drowsiness, loss of concentration and reduced short term memory. All critical elments to learning in a classroom setting. If a child has repeat respiratory infections like sinus, throat or ear infections, the child is given many repeat doses of antibiotics and we now know that overuse of antibiotics creates serious long-term health problems and low-cost, low risk medicines no longer work and higher cost, higher risk antibiotics must be used to fight infections. Resistant strains create higher health costs and higher risks of death in both children and teachers. That is another reason why reducing the triggers and reducing the spread of common infections and illnesses can have a huge impact on attendance, health costs, health issues and test score performance.

These health issues cost even more to ignore than fix. Even at the much reduced reimbursement rates paid by Medicaid, most states are now spending from $1,800 to $2,500 per year per child for the health costs incured through Medicaid. That means five year Medicaid costs are over $12,000 per child, and up to 60% or even 70% of these missed school issues and costs are respiratory related or caused by seasonal contagious illnesses. Approximately 30% of children in America get their insurance through Medicaid programs and the rising costs are driven by respiratory illnesses like allergies and Asthma. We feel strongly that cleaning up the indoor air quality in schools and daycares will have a substantial financial payback to the families, teachers, insurance companies, employers, school districts and the Medicaid programs in each state. In some schools, especial older schools found in low-income areas, up to 100% of students can be on state provided health insurance coverage. These schools also pose the most health risk for teachers and staff who we really need to take care of as they work in some of the oldest and most run down school facilities in the country. The average age of public schools is over 60 years old. Even new schools, built to retain conditioned are get rated by teachers' unions as having even more unhealthy indoor air quality.

These issue are also proven to have a big impact on learning. A constant scratchy throat, runny nose or cough is bad enough, but it is really hard on a teacher who uses his or her voice as their primary teaching tool in the classroom. Students and teachers alike – particularly those with allergies and asthma – have difficulty concentrating and often miss more school when battling the pollen, allergens, dust, mold, bacteria and germs that swarm the room as they study and teach. Poor concentration and classroom attendance lead to lower test scores and impaired learning. Respiratory infections attack frequently and vigorously.