Health Impacts of Air Pollution from Australian Megafires

By -

By Saima Sidik, Eos/AGU. 

Excerpt: From October 2019 to February 2020, fire ripped through the Australian bush with unprecedented intensity, killing 34 people and more than 3 billion animals. In a new study, Graham et al. seek to quantify the health impacts of an indirect form of fire damage: the damage caused by poor air quality. Like car engines, gas stoves, and cigarettes, fires create fine particles with a diameter of less than 2.5 micrometers, called PM2.5. High PM2.5 concentrations can exacerbate a wide range of medical conditions, from lung disease to cardiovascular disease, even leading to death. ...Around 437,000 people were exposed to air with a PM2.5 concentration of least 25 micrograms per cubic meter of air, which is substantially more than the 15 micrograms per cubic meter of air that the World Health Organization considers an acceptable level for short-term exposure. ...Using methodology developed by the World Health Organization, the authors estimated that increased PM2.5 levels brought on by the fires led to 171 deaths, or about 30% of the deaths caused by short-term PM2.5 exposure during this time.…

Popular posts from this blog

Rude Awakening

By -
https://www.science.org/content/article/how-rains-pigs-and-waterbirds-fueled-shocking-disease-outbreak-australia By MEREDITH WADMAN , Science.  Excerpt: The appearance of a “tropical” mosquito-borne illness in southeastern Australia has unsettled researchers. ...McCann was the  fourth patient in as many weeks  admitted to Albury with encephalitis. Like McCann, the three others had turned up feverish and confused. ...among the possible causes were mosquito-borne viruses, in particular two encephalitis-causing viruses endemic to Australia: Kunjin, a strain of West Nile virus, and Murray Valley encephalitis virus (MVEV), named for the river valley where McCann has swum, water skied, fished, and boated since he was a boy. ...As with other weather events, the record-breaking wetness of the 2021–22 season can’t be attributed with certainty to climate change. But as the globe warms, the atmosphere holds more water, enabling more intense rainfall and flooding; daily rainfall associated with th
Read more

Relax, Electric Vehicles Really Are the Best Choice for the Climate

By -
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/24/opinion/electric-vehicle-tesla-hybrid.html By Stephen Porder , The New York Times, opinion piece.  Excerpt: ...I am familiar with trepidation about electric vehicles; ...worry about running out of battery power far from a charging station; ...the upfront costs... though the E.V.  has a lower total cost  over the life of the car. ...Those concerns will likely diminish in 2024 as money from the Inflation Reduction Act flows into building more charging stations and making discounts for electric vehicles available right at the dealership. ...while there are environmental concerns with [electric vehicles], they are dwarfed by the benefit they provide regarding climate change. ...Cobalt, another key component of batteries, has been in the public eye because of its scarcity and the  horrific working conditions for miners  in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Those conditions need to be addressed, but it’s a mistake to view them in isolation. Oil extraction h
Read more

Lost history of Antarctica revealed in octopus DNA

By -
https://www.science.org/content/article/lost-history-antarctica-revealed-octopus-dna By ERIK STOKSTAD .  Excerpt: Some 100,000 years ago, scientists believe Antarctica’s massive western ice sheet collapsed, temporarily opening waterways between a trio of seas surrounding the continent. New evidence for that scenario comes from a surprising source: octopus DNA. ...About 129,000 to 116,000 years ago, a warm spell called the last interglacial gave our planet a brief break in between several million years of ice ages. The average temperature of the planet was about 0.5°C warmer than it is today—and climate projections predict it will be again within decades. The global sea level was also 5 meters to 10 meters higher than current levels. Many scientists believe  the collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and consequent melting could have been a primary reason . ...The findings are consistent with growing geological evidence supporting the ice sheet collapse....
Read more