Table of Contents
Firefighters watch as flames and smoke move through a valley in the Forest Ranch area of Butte … [+]
Air quality warnings are issued because air pollution can have both immediate and long-term health effects. Wildfire smoke contains a variety of particles, including tiny particles called PM2.5, which are 2.5 microns in diameter, compared to 50-70 microns for a human hair. These particles are so fine that they can be inhaled deeply into the lungs. The PM10 particles are more likely to land on larger surfaces of your respiratory tract.
Acute exposure to PM2.5 and PM10 can cause asthma attacks and exacerbations of COPD, and may require emergency care or hospitalization for control. Most likely to be affected are infants, children and adults with heart or lung disease.
Long-term exposure to these particles has been linked to worsening lung disease and premature death from cancer, heart disease, stroke and dementia.
California has been ravaged by wildfires 6,200 this year alone. The states of Oregon and Washington are also at particular risk. Surprisingly, Arizona, Texas, Louisiana and Florida also suffer on average 90-111 smoke days in wildfires annual. Last year, uncontrolled fires spread smoke across Canada, through parts of the northeastern U.S., causing a hazardous air quality warning in New York City. Air quality alerts expanded from Montana to New York and as far south as Georgia. This summer, the upper Midwest will be hit harder by the Canadian fires.
Demographics
We have known for years that the effects of air pollution parallel those of other inequalities. Poor people and city dwellers are hit harder, for example because they live closer to polluting highways or factories. In Africa, Southeast Asia and the Western Pacific, where many rely on cooking stoves that use wood or dung, rural residents and poor people are more affected by smoke.
A report from the American Lung Association notes that predominantly African American communities were at greater risk of premature death from particulate pollution. Another study they cite “found that Hispanics and Asians, but especially blacks, were at greater risk of premature death from particulate pollution than whites,” and that this was not due to economic differences.
Another Stanford study found that blacks are both more likely to be exposed to air pollution and more likely to die from it. Although rates have improved, Blacks had higher attributable mortality due to PM2.5.
Reduce risks
The first thing is to check daily Air Quality Index (AQI) weather forecast to see what precautions you may need.
A comprehensive guideline on air quality is available at AirNow“a partnership of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, National Park Service, NASA, Centers for Disease Control, and tribal, state, and local air quality agencies.” There are also sections on how to protect yourself. For teachers there is a sample curriculum for different ages Breathe Easy.
There are things you can do to reduce your risk from wildfires or other sources of air pollution from PM2.5 particles. If you can, stay indoors and create a “clean room” with few windows and no fireplace. Equip it with HEPA filters, that’s possible make a DIY Corsi-Rosenthal box fan filter for ~$100. This filter also helps reduce your risk of Covid-19 infections.
If you have central air conditioning, use a HEPA or MERV 13 fan filter or higher. You must set the air system to recirculate or close the outside air inlet valve.
The CDC says if you need to be outside where there is wildlife smoke, you should do so wear a NIOSH approved respiratoreither an N-95 or P-100 mask. They emphasize that cloth or paper masks (“baggy blue” surgical masks will NOT filter wildfire smoke). KN-95 masks are not as effective but have less air leakage than surgical masks. These same N-95s are what most experts recommend to protect yourself from Covid as well.
NEW YORK – JUNE 7: Smoky haze from wildfires in Canada reduces visibility of the Empire State … [+]
Mask bans
Masking protects people from a variety of respiratory infections, wildfire smoke and other sources of air pollution. One problem with this personal protection is that several jurisdictions have proposed mask bans for “public safety.” There is no evidence that mask bans make a community safer. Unfortunately, some of these, such as the recent bill passed in Nassau County, New York, do not allow medical exemptions to prevent contracting or passing on infections. Initially, the North Carolina bill had no medical exemptionsbut this has changed. Senator John Bramnick (R-Union) of New Jersey just now submitted such a bill there. (He did not respond to a request for comment). The NJ Star-Ledger Editorial Board noted, “Republicans have tried to criminalize face masks even as COVID cases rise again.” They added that mask bans “threaten personal freedoms by leaving it up to police to decide whether someone has a legitimate medical reason to wear a mask at a public gathering.
How will they know? It’s subjective. And based on past experience, we know what that means: police will disproportionately stop and question black and brown people, who are also will most likely continue to wear masks to protect against COVID-19.”
Masks are banned in North Carolina and Nassau County. They have been proposed by Mayor Bass in Los Angeles, Eric Adams and Kathy Hochul of New York and other jurisdictions.
We recently had >1 million Covid infections and >1000 deaths per week. We have also seen more frequent and intense wildfires, especially in the West and Canada, and we can expect this trend to continue. This will disproportionately hurt people with asthma, COPD or other lung diseases. Yet there are those who are trying to hinder our response to these public health crises.