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How is the San Joaquin Valley affected by smog?
- Kern and Fresno Counties had the highest number of people facing 'very unhealthy' and 'hazardous' ozone exceedance days in 1998 – 6.2 million and 4.9 million respectively. (1)
- For the period 1997-99, every county in the San Joaquin Valley received a grade of "F" for the high number of dangerous smog days. (2)
- In Fresno, Modesto, Bakersfield, Salinas, and Stockton alone, the financial cost of asthma is more than $85 million per year.(3)
HEALTH
How is air pollution from smog (ozone) and soot (particulate matter) harmful to human health?
- In Kern, Kings, Merced, San Joaquin, Tulare counties in the San Joaquin Valley Air District, air pollution kills more people than the state average.(4)
- The California State Health Department estimates indicate that up to 2.2 million Californians have asthma.(5)
SMOG
- When inhaled, smog irritates the respiratory system and causes shortness of breath, wheezing, coughing, and chest pain in addition to aggravation of other lung diseases.
- Smog not only aggravates the respiratory system temporarily; prolonged inhalation of unsafe levels of smog can reduce lung function and development in children, and permanently damage lung tissue.(6)
- Smog exposure can also worsen allergies.(7)
- Ozone can aggravate and worsen asthma attacks.
Who is most harmed by smog?
Although smog is harmful to everyone's lungs, certain groups are disproportionately at risk. They include:
- Children: Children spend more time outdoors during the summer months than adults; at a time when their lungs are still developing. Children also suffer more from asthma and other respiratory ailments that are exacerbated by smog.
- Elderly: Pollution-induced asthma can be especially dangerous in the elderly who suffer from more respiratory tract infections and previous lung damage than younger adults.
- Adults who are active outdoors: Even the healthiest adults who exercise or work outdoors can experience lung damage when pollution levels are high.
- People who suffer from asthma and other respiratory diseases: Asthmatics are at risk because they have decreased lung function and smog can greatly exacerbate the severity of attacks.
- Low-income and people of color: These communities are at a greater risk because they often lack access to culturally and linguistically responsive health care so respiratory ailments, such as asthma, often go undiagnosed and untreated.
SOOT
- Nationwide, air pollution causes between 50,000 and 100,000 premature deaths per year – and soot accounts for a majority of these. Soot is the most deadly air pollutant.(8) Accounting for more deaths than homicides or automobile accidents.
- Soot aggravates asthma attacks.(9)
- Non-fatal effects of soot include reduced lung function and aggravation of respiratory illnesses (such as bronchitis, emphysema, chronic obstructive lung disease, and pneumonia) and heart problems.(10)
- Exposure to small particles of soot, even for short periods of time, increases the risk of heart attacks for one day after exposure.(11)
- Even at levels that are below the national standard, when concentrations of small particulate matter in the air increased, the risk of heart attacks increased. (12)
- According to the California Air Resources Board, diesel soot accounts for 70 percent of the cancer risk from toxic air pollution statewide.(13)
More about asthma
- Nationwide, asthma rates have increased dramatically over the past 15 years.(14)
- In California, from 1990 to 1997, nearly 5,000 people died from asthma.
- Elderly people have the significantly highest risk of dying from asthma.
- Asthma deaths are disproportionately burdening African Americans and other communities of color. The asthma death rate for African American children is over four times greater than the death rate for white children.(15)
- Asthma is the leading cause of school absenteeism – nationally more than 10 million school days are missed each year due to asthma.(16)
- The cost of asthma to the US economy in 1998 was $11.3 billion.(17)
- Hospitalizations account for the largest proportion of costs of asthma treatment, especially for very young children. (18)
- California's Latino children bear a disproportionate risk of pollution-provoked asthma; 29 percent of Latino children lack health insurance and thus lack access to both treatment and preventative care.
- Over 50,000 Californians are hospitalized yearly because of severe asthma attacks and more young children are hospitalized every year for asthma than for any other cause.(19)
- Nearly 12,000 people in the San Joaquin Valley Air District are hospitalized each year, more than 5,000 of whom are children.(20)
AGRICULTURE
How does air pollution affect agriculture?
- The air district estimates annual crop costs in excess of $150 million from air pollution.
- Smog causes trees to lose leaves, slows their growth and causes leaf damage.
- According to EPA, even at relatively low levels of ozone exposure, crops can suffer a 20-40% loss in productivity.(21)
- Ozone exposure makes plants less productive by decreasing their photosynthesis and by causing leaves to die. According to EPA, even at relatively low levels of ozone exposure, crops can suffer a 20-40% loss in productivity.
NATIONAL PARKS
How does air pollution affect our national parks?
- Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks have the highest air pollution levels of any national parks west of the Mississsippi.
- Smog levels in Sequoia and Kings Canyon are sometimes higher than in Los Angeles.(22)
- Tree growth in these parks has been reduced by up to 11 percent.
- Soot pollution reduces visibility levels in the national parks.
- Ponderosa pines and Jeffrey pines are especially susceptible to ozone pollution, even at "normal" levels – which makes high smog days even more detrimental to growth.
- Sequoia seedlings are also highly sensitive to pollution.
- A vast majority of the trees in a study by the Forest Service in Sierra and Sequoia National Forests show smog damage. Trees in the foothills outside of the parks (black oaks in particular) and in San Joaquin Valley are also highly susceptible to smog damage.(23)
Footnotes:
1. Calculated by multiplying the "at-risk" population by the number of very unhealthy and hazardous ozone exceedence days. (http://www.greatvalley.org/research/publications/index.htm)
2. American Lung Association "State of the Air 20010" Data for California available at: http://www.lungusa.org/air2001/states/s_california.html. Full report available at http://www.lungusa.org/air2001/index.html
3. Asthma and Allergy Foundation of America http://www.aafa.org/highcosts/city.html
4. Chart book on mortality
5. State Hospitalization Chart Book
6. State of the Air 2001, ALA
7. Asthma and the Environment, President's Task Force on Environmental Health, May 2000. Report available at: http://www.epa.gov/children/whatwe/fin.pdf
8. State of the Air 2001
9. State of the Air
10. American Lung Association of California urges Conservation, Renewable Energy, and Emergency-Only use of Diesel Generators, June 5, 2001. also at www.californialung.com/spotlight/cleanair01_nr.html
11. Peters, Annette et al (2001), Increased Particulate Air Pollution and the Triggering of Myocardial Infarction, Circulation, vol. 103, pp.2810-2815. Also available on the web at www.circulationaha.org
12. Peters, Annette et al (2001), Increased Particulate Air Pollution and the Triggering of Myocardial Infarction, Circulation, vol. 103, pp.2810-2815. Also available on the web at www.circulationaha.org
13. ALAC position statement on diesel available at www.californialung.com/spotlight/cleanair01_nr.html
14. Asthma and the Environment, President's Task Force on Environmental Health, May 2000. Report available at: http://www.epa.gov/children/whatwe/fin.pdf
15. Asthma and the Environment, President's Task Force on Environmental Health, May 2000. Report available at: http://www.epa.gov/children/whatwe/fin.pdf
16. President's Task Force on Environmental Health Risks and Safety Risks to Children, Asthma and the Environment: A Strategy to Protect Children. January 28, 1999(Revised May 2000). Available at www.epa.gov/children/what/fin.pdf
17. Asthma and the Environment, President's Task Force on Environmental Health, May 2000. Report available at: http://www.epa.gov/children/whatwe/fin.pdf
18. Smith, David et al. (1997), A National Estimate of the Economic Costs of Asthma, American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Vol.156, pp. 787-793. Also available online at http://ajrccm.atsjournals.org
19. DHS CA County Asthma Hospitalization Chart Book
20. California County Asthma Hospitalization Chart Book, CA Department of Health Services, August 2000. Report available at http://www.dhs.ca.gov/ps/deodc/ehib/ehib2/topics/asthma.html
21. Below the Valley's 14 ppb maximum of both 2000 and 2001.
22. April 2001, Assessment of Air Quality and Air Pollutant Impacts in Class I National Parks in California, published by the US Dept of the Interior
23. Campbell, Sally et al. (2000) Monitoring for Ozone Injury in West Coast (Oregon, Washington, California) Forests in 1998. USDA/Forest Service Pacific Northwest Research Station General Technical Report. Report available at www.fs.fed.us/pnw/pubs.htm
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