China
Africa
Explore chapters and articles related to this topic
Community and environment as determinants of health
Published in Ben Y.F. Fong, Martin C.S. Wong, The Routledge Handbook of Public Health and the Community, 2021
Thomas Man-chi Dao, Bean S.N. Fu
Draught poses a threat to human as a result of inadequate freshwater supply. It can also cause dust storms, which is a severe form of air pollution. Draught also increases the risk of naturally occurring forest fires, which is disastrous to the ecosystem and produce serious air pollutions. In the Summer of 2019–20, a catastrophic forest fire hit Australia, resulting in a mass destruction of forestland and nearly 3 billion animals were killed or displaced (World Wide Fund for Nature, 2020). In 2020, California had the most serious wildfire in history, with a total of more than 4 million acres burned (Center for Disaster Philanthropy, 2020). Hurricane can bring tremendous destructions by strong wind and heavy rain. Residents in coastal regions may suffer from water-borne and vector-borne diseases after the storm.
Health impact of disasters on older people
Published in Emily Ying Yang Chan, Disaster Public Health and Older People, 2019
Fires are a common injury and disaster risk across the world. In developed contexts such as the United States, Barillo and Goode (1996) showed that fire was responsible for 20 times more death than other natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods. For seniors aged over 70, fire-related fatalities was double that of other age groups. Other fire epidemiological trend studies also show that fire mortality risks increased with age (Burdge, Katz, Edwards, & Ruberg, 1988). For wildfire incidents, studies in the United States also pointed out that older people were likely to be victims (Shusterman, Kaplan, & Canbarro, 1993) and medically affected (Sutherland, Make, Vedal, Zhang, Dutton, Murphy, & Silkoff, 2005; Analitis, Geogiadis, & Kotsouyanni, 2012; Kochi, Champ, Loomis, & Donovan, 2012). Studies indicate community responders of older age are also at risk. A study of mortality of volunteer firefighters found that those in the older age group (60+) were more likely to die of overexertion, stress and underlying medical conditions (Mangan, 1999).
Global Heating – ‘The Future Ain’t What It Used to Be’
Published in Jacques Derek Charlwood, The Ecology of Malaria Vectors, 2019
If the rate of climate change is too large or too fast, a tipping point can be crossed, and a rapid biome shift may occur via extensive disturbances such as wildfires, insect attacks or droughts. In some cases, such as widespread wildfires, there could be a pulse of carbon to the atmosphere, which, if large enough, could influence the trajectory of the Earth system. For some of the tipping elements, crossing the tipping point could trigger an abrupt, nonlinear response such as the conversion of large areas of the Amazon rainforest to a savannah or seasonally dry forest, while for others, crossing the tipping point would lead to a more gradual but self-perpetuating response, which may happen with large-scale loss of permafrost. There could also be considerable lags after the crossing of a threshold, particularly for those tipping elements that involve the melting of large masses of ice. Cascades could be formed when a rise in global temperature reaches the level of the lower temperature cluster, activating tipping elements, such as loss of the Greenland ice sheet or Arctic sea ice. These tipping elements, along with some of the non-tipping element feedbacks such as a gradual weakening of land and ocean physiological carbon sinks, could push the global average temperature even higher, inducing tipping in mid- and higher temperature clusters.
SARS-CoV-2 IgG Seropositivity and Acute Asymptomatic Infection Rate among Firefighter First Responders in an Early Outbreak County in California
Published in Prehospital Emergency Care, 2022
Jennifer A. Newberry, Marc Gautreau, Katherine Staats, Eli Carrillo, William Mulkerin, Samuel Yang, Michael A. Kohn, Loretta Matheson, Scott D. Boyd, Benjamin A. Pinsky, Andra L. Blomkalns, Matthew C. Strehlow, Peter A. D’Souza
Further, work and living condition changes, such as masks and cleaning protocols, may have prevented living in a fire station from being a recurrent superspreading event. The fire departments in the study all implemented various levels of changes in living quarters early in the pandemic with increased attention on protocol adherence as cases rose over late summer. In our study, most of the firefighters lived outside of the county. Consequently, there was significant travel occurring weekly to monthly between this county, other regions of California, and across five other states. Efforts required to fight wildfires create similar conditions of increased exposure risk and travel. Both fire camps where firefighters stay and incident command where activities are coordinated present scenarios where firefighters must work together with little ability to socially distance (17). Lessons learned from the pandemic should be evaluated for their utility in these situations as well.
Understanding the relationships between environmental factors and exacerbations of COPD
Published in Expert Review of Respiratory Medicine, 2021
Alicia V Gayle, Jennifer K Quint, Elaine I Fuertes
According to data from 16 climate models, as of 2050, about 50% of all summers will be accompanied by heatwaves [54]. Heatwaves not only contribute to the drying of land and a creation of fuel for the rapid spread of wildfires, but also increase the morbidity associated with chronic diseases and the frequency of hospitalizations in the areas they affect. The mechanisms by which heat exposure adversely affects COPD exacerbations are not entirely understood. The combination of heat stress and a high concentration of ambient air pollutants, including NO2 and O3, could cause inflammation of the bronchial mucosa as well as a reduction in the bronchoconstriction threshold, increasing the risk of acute injury to lung tissue [54]. Heat also causes people to flush; moving blood closer to the skin to shed excess heat decreases the amount of oxygen taken into the lungs [55].
Smoldering and flaming biomass wood smoke inhibit respiratory responses in mice
Published in Inhalation Toxicology, 2019
Marie McGee Hargrove, Yong Ho Kim, Charly King, Charles E. Wood, M. Ian Gilmour, Janice A. Dye, Stephen H. Gavett
Wildfires have increased in frequency and severity resulting in longer wildfire seasons over the last 30 years within the United States (Westerling et al. 2006). In 2017 alone, wildfires burned over 10 million acres (National Interagency Fire Center 2018). Wildfire smoke composition is influenced by several factors including fuel composition and moisture content, fire temperature, and wind conditions (Liu and Wimberly 2015). Wildfire smoke contains a number of air pollutants including particulate matter (PM), carbon monoxide (CO), carbon dioxide (CO2), nitric oxide (NO), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), ozone, volatile organic compounds (VOCs), and polycyclic aromatic compounds (PAHs) (Jerrett et al. 2005; Urbanski et al. 2009; Black et al. 2017). Low temperature smoldering biomass burning releases high concentrations of PM, while high temperature flaming conditions produce higher CO2 and nitrogen oxides at comparable emissions of CO (Kim et al. 2018). Air quality is affected by primary and secondary pollutants derived from wildfire smoke emissions. As wildfire smoke emissions continue to increase, susceptible populations such as children, older adults and individuals with preexisting cardiovascular and respiratory illnesses are at risk.