Where there’s smoke, there’s health risks for vulnerable groups
, his usually treatable condition made deadly by wildfire smoke that blanketed his home community of 100 Mile House, B.C., along with expressing the hope that the “heartbreaking loss” would create greater public awareness about the dangers of wildfire smoke, extreme heat and other climate-related risks.It’s a grim reminder that the smoke that has now become ubiquitous because of wildfiresis not benign. Neither is the extreme heat that is helping to transform vast forests into tinderboxes.
More than 10 million hectares have already gone up in smoke in Canada this year, with hundreds of firesand the worst of the fire season yet to come. The quantity of smoke produced is formidable, and can carry for hundreds of kilometres. Smoke, and especially the particulate matter it creates, poses a significant health risk for vulnerable populations like children, the elderly, and especially those with chronic respiratory conditions such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease .
“What Carter’s story tells me is that we are woefully unprepared for the health impacts of climate change as a society and in the health care system,” Dr. Melissa Lem, president of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment ,
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