Almost nobody in New York City (where the NYT is based and focuses its coverage) has a vent hood that vents outside the apartment.
Older buildings don't have a hood at all, and new buildings have hoods which circulate air within the apartment, which doesn't really address concerns about accumulation of environmental pollutants.
Thanks. If this bit of context was clear from the get go it would have been a lot easier for those from EUR where we would expect vents outside the apartment to be the norm. ( Not speaking for all EUR, so there may be places this is not the norm )
As a matter of fact this is the first time I hear about vent circulating within the apartment, and to be honest this sounds quite scary.
It is the norm in newer buildings, but there are plenty of older houses or flats blocks in the EU that don’t have a good ventilation system. It’s similarly expensive same in the UK and I cannot say about Norway and Switzerland, but I would think that it is not better in the other non-EU bits of Europe.