December 8, 2025
Utilizing 6.6 million patient records from the American Family Cohort (AFC) dataset, we investigated the impact of air quality on five-year mortality. We found that patients in the group with an Air Quality Index (AQI) > 50 had an adjusted hazard of death that was 4.02 times higher than those in the group with AQI < 50. This increased hazard was most pronounced in specific demographics: Black/African American patients faced a 4.27 times higher hazard of death, and patients older than 80 years had a 6.73 times higher hazard of death, demonstrating that poor air quality is a significant and unequal social determinant of health.