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The wildfire smoke blanketing cities this summer can be harmful for children, both physically and emotionally. But caregivers can take some steps to make things a little easier.

First, here are three new stories from The Atlantic:

What happened when Oregon decriminalized hard drugs The humiliation of Ron DeSantis Oppenheimer is more than a creation myth about the atomic bomb.

Little Lungs

On the day the sky turned orange, I woke up with a nosebleed. I have gotten only a handful of nosebleeds in my life. I’d slept on that night in June with my windows open, and those hours of exposure had apparently left my relatively young and healthy body disrupted. I was alarmed that this had happened to me. But I was also alarmed about what the haze might mean for people in more vulnerable bodies than mine.

As plumes of toxic smoke from Canadian wildfires have blanketed parts of America this summer, East Coasters and midwesterners are getting a dose of the environmental hazard that people on the West Coast (and around the world) have been dealing with for years, and extreme smoke days will likely continue in the months ahead. My iPhone’s weather app has warned me on several days this summer, including today, that the air in New York is “unhealthy for sensitive groups.”

Children are sensitive, in part because, simply put, they are little: Kids breathe in more air each minute than adults do. “High levels of particulate matter can get deep into lung fields” during a bad smoke day, which may cause adverse effects, Marissa Hauptman, a pediatrician at Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital, where she works on environmental health, told me. And children’s developing organs are more prone to injury. “The younger the child, the more vulnerable they are,” she said. Kids with existing health conditions, such as asthma or diabetes, or children born prematurely, can be especially at risk on smoky days. Rima Habre, an associate professor at the University of Southern California with expertise in environmental health, told me in an email that “cough, runny nose, itchy or burning eyes, wheezing or difficulty breathing, and irritation in their eyes and throats” are among the issues children may face after being exposed to wildfire smoke.

The Canadian fires are likely to continue raging this summer. Nearly 900 fires are currently burning in Canada, including about 560 that the Canadian government has marked “out of control.” As my colleague Caroline Mimbs Nyce has written, “millions of Americans will have to brace themselves for more extreme smoke days. For exactly how long depends on a number of factors, including, quite literally, which way the wind blows.”

Parents and caregivers cannot control the wind. But they can take steps to protect kids from toxic air. The best thing to do to reduce exposure—as you might’ve already guessed—is to stay indoors with windows closed. Having HEPA filters, or AC units with filters, can improve air quality in your home too, Hauptman said. If you’re driving long distances, she recommended using your car’s air-recirculation mode while running the AC. If children do need to go outside for short periods on smoky days, experts advise that kids old enough to wear masks wear well-fitting NIOSH-approved N95 masks.

Parents should stay abreast of air-quality changes in their area, and they should “prepare at least one clean air room in their residence,” Habre said. She noted that the EPA website airnow.gov offers free resources on how to set up a clean-air room, as well as reliable updates on air quality.

The physical effects of smoke can be hard on small children, but so can the emotional ones. In addition to the terror of hearing about the fires, downstream impacts such as canceled days at camp can be difficult. Smoke is cutting into the summer rituals that give children’s days meaning, texture, and fun. Hauptman said that it’s important to avoid saturating kids with scary images and news stories. Caregivers should reinforce to children that, in spite of the bad circumstances, there are people helping: Talking with kids about the firefighters, nurses, and others keeping the community safe can be a balm, Hauptman added.

When the air outside is toxic, parents need to consider a number of factors, including their children’s age and health conditions. Kids are often active, and the time they spend outdoors running and playing can be great for their health. But on bad-air days, that calculus changes. These types of decisions aren’t easy, but they are, and will remain, the reality as parents consider choices about smoke, extreme heat, and COVID. “I think we’re going to be facing more and more days where you’re going to have to weigh your risk tolerance and think about how the environment is directly impacting your health,” Hauptman told me.

Smoky days are especially brutal when they coincide with the hottest days. And both can disproportionately affect those with fewer resources. Families that can afford reliable air-conditioning and air filters will be able to stay relatively insulated from heat and smoke, Hauptman noted. Households without AC or filters, meanwhile, are in a difficult position. Many schools have solid resources in place to handle smoke, but others don’t have up-to-date systems. Toxic air, coupled with rising temperatures, is a severe health concern—and it’s also “an environmental-justice issue,” Hautpman said.

Related:

Podcast: “Sorry, honey, it’s too hot for camp.” How long will Canada burn?

Today’s News

Two IRS whistleblowers have alleged that the Hunter Biden criminal probe was mishandled, leading Republicans to call for the impeachment of Attorney General Merrick Garland. Marc Tessier-Lavigne, the president of Stanford University, will resign after a report found significant flaws in his research. The investigation did not find evidence of fraud or misconduct—which Tessier-Lavigne has denied—but he said that he will step down “for the good of the University” and retract and correct the flawed papers. Wesleyan University announced that it will end legacy admissions, citing the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on affirmative action.

Evening Read

Illustration by The Atlantic. Sources: Getty; The Hollywood Archive / Alamy.

I Am a Joke Machine

By Natasha Vaynblat

I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her. Specifically, I’m just a girl, waving a picket sign in front of a studio exec, asking him for fair pay. Picture John Cusack holding a boom box that blasts “What do we want? Contracts! When do we want them? Now!”

I write for late-night comedy but I’ve always seen my life through film tropes. And these past two and a half months since the Hollywood writers’ strike began have made me feel like I’m trapped in the labor-dispute version of a rom-com. If the metaphor sounds like a stretch, please remember: I’ve been picketing in 90-plus-degree New York, so I’m operating on heat-stroke logic.

Read the full article.

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P.S.

Today, I wrote about hard decisions early in life. Recently, I read a book about hard decisions at the late stages of life that moved me: Don DeLillo’s Zero K. In one passage that has stayed with me, a character reflects on the small, beautiful elements that make up a life. She describes a shower to her stepson: “I think about drops of water,” she says. “I think about drops of water. How I used to stand in the shower and watch a drop of water edge down the inside of the sheer curtain. How I concentrated on the drop, the droplet, the orblet, and waited for it to assume new shapes as it passed along the ridges and folds, with water pounding against the side of my head.”

— Lora

Katherine Hu contributed to this newsletter.

I’m just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her. Specifically, I’m just a girl, waving a picket sign in front of a studio exec, asking him for fair pay. Picture John Cusack holding a boom box that blasts “What do we want? Contracts! When do we want them? Now!”

I write for late-night comedy but I’ve always seen my life through film tropes. And these past two and a half months since the Hollywood writers’ strike began have made me feel like I’m trapped in the labor-dispute version of a rom-com. If the metaphor sounds like a stretch, please remember: I’ve been picketing in 90-plus-degree New York, so I’m operating on heat-stroke logic.

[Xochitl Gonzalez: The businessmen broke Hollywood]

Like many rom-coms, we start with two lovers searching for the thing that will complete them. In She’s All That, Rachael Leigh Cook thinks that all she needs is to paint, but she also needs a good prom date and contacts; Freddie Prinze Jr. thinks all he needs is to win a bet, when what he really needs is to win the love of a good woman in overalls. Or in American Pie, Jason Biggs thinks he needs a foreign-exchange student who doesn’t believe in underwear, but what he really needs is an innovative flute player who believes in camp. In my rom-com, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers is the dumb jock, or maybe Mr. Big—the guy who fails to see that he just needs a smart writer by his side.

Hollywood writers, and now actors, have gone on strike for many reasons, but one of the most pressing is the studios’ eagerness to downsize writers’ rooms and begin finding ways to replace writers with artificial intelligence. AI—she’s young, she’s fun, she’s willing to do whatever you want at any hour of the night. AI is Sarah Jessica Parker in a miniskirt, and the writers are the First Wives Club still trying to save the marriage.

I see the appeal of a computer that can churn out 50 jokes about Mark Zuckerberg’s new abs. But I can do that too! I am a joke machine—and so are my colleagues. But unlike AI, I’ll also throw in a few jokes about Zuck’s Caesar haircut and slide in a reference to Meta ruining democracy. I can bend and snap! (Which is why I need health insurance.)

I always wanted to write for television. I quit a steady job teaching high school and spent all my savings on Upright Citizens Brigade classes and all my nights at open mics at bars that have now turned into luxury dog spas. After more than a decade, I got my first steady gig on NBC’s A Little Late With Lilly Singh. To extend the rom-com metaphor: I was smitten, but NBC just wasn’t feeling it. After months of ghosting, I was told there would be no Season 3. Heartbroken and in need of a rebound, I went to bed with branded content, writing snarky replies for hot dogs and face creams with irreverent personalities. It was fun but it wasn’t serious. Late-night television still had my heart.

Finally, I got a job on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. I cried more the first time a studio audience laughed at a joke I’d written than I did at my own wedding. But (cue Carrie Bradshaw’s Sex and the City voice-over) I couldn’t help but wonder … what was up with that residual check for $1.08?

Residuals are what I get paid if an episode re-airs somewhere, and it’s the other main sticking point motivating the strike. Studios are refusing to pay adequate residuals for content that runs on streaming platforms. The difference between what I get paid if my episode airs on NBC’s Peacock versus on NBC proper is the difference between The Devil Wears Prada Anne Hathaway pre– and post–Stanley Tucci. Residuals are what sustain writers as they go from project to project. Without them, writing stops being a profession and turns into a gig, which is how you lose not just a guy but 10 writers in 10 days.

I guess it’s now time to address the villain, because even a romance has to have one: corporate greed. Like Sarah Michelle Gellar in Cruel Intentions, corporate greed is a heartless hottie gaslighting you into thinking she’s a good girl. Don’t let the cross necklace fool you; it’s full of cocaine. Studio execs would lose a fraction of their wealth if they met our demands. When accounting for inflation, writers’ pay has declined by 14 percent in the past five years. Ten years ago, 33 percent of TV writers were paid at the minimum rate; now half are. This makes it harder for me to stay in the business and for younger writers to break through. Not investing in talent is what Pretty Woman’s Julia Roberts would call a big mistake. Huge.

[Read: Why you should pay attention to the Hollywood writers’ strike]

I’m so grateful to the writers, actors, and producers who brought the romantic comedies I love into the world. When Harry Met Sally taught me how to love and how to eat a sandwich. Mrs. Doubtfire showed me the power of family and drag. Love & Basketball was the only time I’ve enjoyed watching sports. My heart breaks when I think about all of the great art currently on hold because of the studios’ dismissal of the writers’ and actors’ needs.

I’m still hopeful this drama has a happy ending. And that’s why I’m standing at the top of the Empire State Building with a red rose in my hand and a pencil behind my ear, waiting for a fair deal.