“I was expecting for us to see an association between wildfire smoke exposure and dementia… But the fact we see so much stronger of an association for wildfire as compared to non-wildfire smoke exposure was kind of surprising.”
Dr. Holly Elser, smoke study author and an epidemiologist and resident physician in neurology at the University of Pennsylvania.
After all the scientific evidence, it is beyond speculation: the explosions of wildfires are directly related to rise of heat and persistence in such temperatures across the West. Drier brush ignites more easily and spreads fire much faster, lacking the water content that used to moderate forest fires decades ago. As I read the Republican (MAGA) position on the underlying causation – climate change from the release of greenhouse carbon emissions, initially just the industrial, power generation and automotive effluents – their platform is to reduce government expenditures and tax incentives on climate change containment, cancel existing related infrastructure projects and ramp up our use of oil and gas to power America. What we’re seeing is “normal” and just self-correcting “naturally cyclical,” they say. That is what BIG OIL and related industries are paying them to say and do.
Folks who live in these drier areas either cannot get homeowners insurance or can access it at increadibly higher rates. And more than a few will just die from the heat. But not only is the mass of wildfires destroying nature’s best carbon dioxide scrubbers on earth – green plants including our masses of forests – the rise in the amount and nature of smoke from wildfires has largely been ignored or marginalized. In wildfires, there are other chemicals too. Today’s blog will focus on the physiological harm to humans (and animals too) that smoke from forestfires creates. And, as the above quote suggests, wildfire smoke has it own level of toxicity that is different from so many other forms of smoke. So, let’s look at the issues.
First the words. According to the California Resources Board, “Airborne particulate matter (PM) is not a single pollutant, but rather is a mixture of many chemical species... Particles vary widely in size, shape and chemical composition, and may contain inorganic ions, metallic compounds, elemental carbon, organic compounds, and compounds from the earth’s crust. Particles are defined by their diameter for air quality regulatory purposes. Those with a diameter of 10 microns or less (PM10) are inhalable into the lungs and can induce adverse health effects. Fine particulate matter is defined as particles that are 2.5 microns or less in diameter (PM2.5)… [and are abosrbed into the body’s organs].” Now the impact.
Lora Kelley, writing for July 30th The Atlantic Daily, generated this input from smoke expert Zoë Schlanger: “Extreme wildfires are more common now than they were just a short time ago. Researchers like to talk about this in terms of land area burned. Wildfires today are burning nearly twice as much tree cover globally as they did in 2001. In the United States, the 10 years with the largest acreage burned have occurred since 2004… The peak of wildfire season in the U.S. is also changing as we get hotter temperatures earlier in the season. It used to be that the peak was generally in August; now it’s generally in July…
“Over the past few years, I’ve watched people walk around several cities during a wildfire-smoke event without any sort of personal protection, even though masks would provide health benefits. Hurricanes are massive, violent disturbances, whereas smoke is subtler. But the main reason that people aren’t heeding the risks of smoke is that we are largely left on our own to deal with it. Government officials issue some warnings, but those are generally: Stay home; wear a mask; run an air filter. Those messages aren’t always getting disseminated very far.
“If you are not someone who can afford an air filter or can afford to stay home, you’re not necessarily going to have the luxury of heeding any of those warnings. And at least in the U.S., there’s very little regulation around labor protections for people who work outside… We know a lot about PM 2.5, the particulate matter that is a main component of wildfire smoke. We know that it is small enough to slip into the bloodstream, and that rates of Parkinson’s and dementia may go up. In children, cognitive and behavioral problems have been found to be linked to PM 2.5 exposure. And, of course, people may experience breathing and heart problems.
“A lot of good scientific work has happened in this area, but with wildfire smoke, other components can complicate the picture. Let’s say a whole town burns. That might include trees, structures, some industrial facilities. It’s a really complex picture to sort out—there are likely chemicals present that are not in other studied sources of PM 2.5, such as, say, tailpipes and power plants.
“Public-health officials also have to contend with the human tendency to not really see harm that’s spread out over a longer period of time. Many of the health problems from wildfire smoke won’t happen right away and so are less likely to be clearly linked to the smoke in one’s mind, unless you know to look out for it.” Dementia is particularly amplified by wildfire smoke.
Writing for the July 31st Los Angeles Times, Alex Wigglesworth drills down on this particular form of smoke-related toxicity: Exposure to wildfire smoke increases the odds of being diagnosed with dementia even more than exposure to other forms of air pollution, according to a landmark study of more than 1.2 million Californians. The study — released Monday [7/29] at the Alzheimer’s Assn. International Conference in Philadelphia — is the largest and most comprehensive review of the impact of wildfire smoke on brain health to date, according to its authors…
“The findings have big health implications, particularly in Western states, where air pollution produced by wildfires now accounts for up to half of all fine-particle pollution — a figure that’s been trending upward as wildfires grow larger and more intense due to climate change and legacies of fire suppression and industrial logging that have altered the composition of many Western forests.
“PM2.5… particles are 30 times smaller than the width of a human hair — tiny enough to penetrate deeply into the lungs and cross over into the bloodstream, where they can cause inflammation. Exposure has been shown to raise the risk of dementia and a host of other conditions, including heart disease, asthma and low birth weight… Looking at participants’ average wildfire PM2.5 exposure over three years, the researchers found a 21% increase in the odds of a dementia diagnosis for each increase of 1 microgram of particulate matter per cubic meter of air. When it came to non-wildfire PM 2.5 exposure, they documented a 3% increased risk of dementia diagnoses for each increase of 3 micrograms of particulate matter per cubic meter of air… ‘That’s what it comes down to, is what’s so different about wildfire smoke?’ [said study author Joan Casey, associate professor of public health at the University of Washington].
“More research is needed to learn exactly what that is. Possibilities include the fact that wildfire particles are produced at higher temperatures, contain a greater concentration of toxic chemicals and are, on average, smaller than PM2.5 from other sources… These ultrafine particles can translocate from people’s noses into their brains via the olfactory bulb, Casey said.” In the end, voters may not be aware that the November elections just might cost them their health and their life. They should already be receiving their homeowners’ bills if they only care about money.
I’m Peter Dekom, and even with all the conflicts all over the world and the “at each other’s throat” polarization here in the United States, the greatest existential threat to our planet and the lifeforms on it (read: “and human beings”) is and will remain uncontained climate change… until we decide to do something meaningful about it!
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