New York experienced its worst air quality on record this Wednesday as wildfire smoke poured in from Canada, blanketing the sky in a science-fiction-like orange glow on Wednesday. Schools on the East Coast cancelled outdoor activities, Broadway shows were cancelled and flights were halted. Big Apple became the city with the worst air quality in the world, even outranking New Delhi, a city that is notorious for its toxic air. Residents appeared alarmed at the sudden and dramatic onset, donning face masks they had only recently ditched as the coronavirus emergency subsided. But while this might be the first time New Yorkers have experienced something of this magnitude, it certainly won’t be the last. Smog is choking New York but for many cities, including Lahore and New Delhi, smoke-filled skies are not the exception but the norm. Last year, six of the world’s 10 most polluted cities were in India, reducing the life expectancy of millions of Indians by as much as nine years. But perhaps the city most notorious for its pollution-and that most successfully turned things around-in Beijing. For years, residents in the Chinese capital breathed in the toxic year every day, culminating in the infamous Beijing airpocalypse when the air quality index hit 705. The event prompted China to launch a sweeping anti-pollution campaign-shutting down coal mines, setting up nationwide air monitoring stations and rolling out new regulations. In 2023, photos of Beijing mostly show clear blue skies-a promising sign and evidence that the right policies can help fix air quality. Human-caused climate change has exacerbated the hot and dry conditions that allow wildfires to ignite and grow-in fact, millions of acres scorched by wildfires in Canada and the US can very well be traced back to carbon pollution from the world’s largest fossil fuel companies. Even cities like New York that generally get healthy air aren’t immune to the problem anymore-perhaps the image of the world’s financial capital shrouded in smoke will finally help us rationalise the extent of what we’ve lost and will continue to lose to climate change. *