Wildfire smoke: A burning health issue is getting worse

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

EVERETT — Health experts are urging Washingtonians to prepare for more of what they suffered through last September — what the Department of Ecology called an unprecedented smoky siege. It lasted nearly two weeks. For one five-day period, every air quality monitor in the state registered unhealthy levels.

Increasing exposure to wildfire smoke, brought courtesy of climate change, is unhealthy not just for the 894,000 residents who live with asthma or chronic lung disease. And not just for children, pregnant women and the elderly, though they are also at special risk. Smoke is bad for everybody.

“There is no safe level of smoke,” said Carrie Nyssen, senior director of advocacy for the American Lung Association Washington.

An intense wildfire season is already underway in drought-stricken expanses of the West, and fire forecast maps for summer are full of angry red. The best entry point for advice and updates is the state smoke blog, wasmoke.blogspot.com. June posts include “10 tips for planning ahead.” The culprit in smoke is toxic particulate pollution known as PM2.5. Those tiny soot particles wedge into lungs and stress hearts. The result can be fatal. A 2019 University of Washington study that calculated the odds of death from forest fire smoke in the state had some surprising results.

https://www.heraldnet.com/news/wildfire-smoke-a-burning-health-issue-is-getting-worse/

[demigoddess]

1. smoke of all kinds gives me migraines. Last week I woke up with a migraine in the middle

of the night. I figured it was those fire pits that are cropping up all over. Why??? Do not understand their popularity, especially in a fire zone.

[samnsara]

2. kittitas county under severe fire weather warning so we are getting grab n go boxes

.....and four dogs. I live in the woods!