Buildings are a lot tighter. Build to a modern standard with blower door testing to verify and there are not enough air changes. Dedicated fresh air ventilation is not yet required in many jurisdictions and most of the systems installed require frequent maintenance or they cease to work. Unless someone has a large crop of plants in the house its going to have poor air quality even without unvented gas appliances. BTW, this applies to both natural gas and propane appliances, they both put out Carbon Monoxide (CO), Nitrogen Dioxide, NO2 PM 2.5 and submicron particles. In many cases they have or had standing pilots so its 24/7 pollution.
It is like lead paint, asbestos and mercury. Lead paint was great stuff, it was durable with great coverage and easy to clean. Asbestos was the wonder fiber, used in floor tiles, gasketing, and heat shields. Thermostats and occasionally appliances has mercury in them and many kids myself included couldnt resist playing with mercury. All three obviously had a big down side, mercury and lead both are accumulative nerve toxins and asbestos is a major source of lung cancer. Most people didnt know the risk and wouldnt have taken it if they had known. These were also there for the long term, the original owner may have long since sold but the problem remained for unsuspecting homeowners. Sad to say, growing kids are like sponges and they dont have say in whether or not take the voluntary risk.
The government is not banning existing gas stoves, they are just proposing phasing them out. The other aspect is that most new electric stoves are induction stoves, yes they still use electricity, but they use much less of it and has the similar gas burner fast heat response that calrod type electric stoves cannot match. I bought a counter top type unit two years ago and it rare I ever use the conventional burners unless I need a couple of them at the same time. Most bakers acknowledge that electric convection ovens are superior to gas ovens and many high end ranges are now induction cook top with a convection oven.
I do agree this does put load on the grid and just as importantly to some folks it means that when the power is down the ability to cook. I generate all my power plus charge my hybrid from solar and havent bought electricity for at least 10 years so my electric range is not a total roadblock to a future renewable power system. I happen to live in a part of the grid where all of the power is renewable 24/7. Due to grid limitations all the power cannot be exported elsewhere so if our region does not use it, the plants have to be cranked down.
IMO, this is not a subversive effort to take away someone independence, its an acknowledgment of a controllable risk that can be mitigated by phasing out the source. Unfortunately this lines up with the whole political scenario in the country. I guess the antivaxers are either dead been proven wrong so they need to move on and take up another "windmill" to fight against.
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