Thunderstorm Asthma Outbreak Death Toll Rises To Eight In Melbourne - NYT
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Mr. McGann was one of thousands of people in Melbourne having an attack of thunderstorm asthma. They flooded the city’s emergency rooms, swamped ambulance call lines and joined lines around pharmacies during six hours on Nov. 21. All were struggling for breath. About 8,500 people went to hospitals. Eight have died, and one remains in intensive care more than a week after a thunderstorm surged across Melbourne, carrying pollen that strong winds and rain broke into tiny fragments.
Perennial ryegrass seeds were swept up in whorls of wind and carried from four million hectares of pasturelands (about 9.9 million acres) that lie to Melbourne’s north and west. If broken into fragments, they are so fine that they can be inhaled.
So many people became ill so quickly that some of the state’s crisis medical teams were stretched beyond their limits. Firefighters and police officers stepped in where paramedics were overloaded. Triage centers at 10 hospitals struggled with admissions across Melbourne, Australia’s second-largest city, with a population of 4.4 million in the greater metropolitan area and suburbs.
“This was a health emergency of an unprecedented scale,” said Jill Hennessy, the minister for health and ambulance services in Victoria State, announcing a statewide inquiry. “We have an obligation to ensure that we learn every lesson there is to learn from this event.” Days later, she pledged $375 million to add 450 paramedics and build more ambulance stations.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/29/world/australia/melbourne-australia-thunderstorm-asthma-attacks.html