Forest fires cause pollution crisis in Asia

Wood smoke exposure induces a pulmonary and systemic inflammatory response in firefighters

“…While wood smoke contains high concentrations of both particulate matter and gaseous compounds, wood smoke particles are similar in size to urban combustiongenerated particles, and within the respirable size range that is thought to be most damaging to human health [22]. Epidemiological and toxicological evidence of the adverse effects of wood smoke have recently been reviewed by NAEHER et al [21] and support several other studies indicating that increases in cardiopulmonary morbidity are related to smoke from forest fires and biomass burning [23][24][25][26][27]. For example, health impact surveillance during severe forest fires in Southeast Asia in 1997 (where particles were the main pollutant) showed a 30% increase in outpatient medical attendance for haze-related conditions in the general population of Singapore [25].…”

“…However, in ''at-risk'' subjects with conditions such as asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, this upper and lower respiratory tract irritation may be sufficient to exacerbate the lung condition. This is supported by the significant increase in outpatient visits and hospitalisations for respiratory illnesses in children, during the forest fires of Southern California, USA [24], and in both Singapore [25] and Indonesia [26] in 1997.…”

“…Given the high smoke exposures experienced by firefighters and the epidemiological evidence indicating association between exposure to wood smoke and adverse health [23][24][25][26][27], the present authors postulated that acute exposure to smoke from forest fires provokes a local inflammatory response in the lungs and stimulates a measurable systemic inflammatory response. In order to test this hypothesis, healthy seasonal firefighters from the British Columbia Forest Service (BCFS) were recruited before the fire season, when relevant parameters of health (questionnaires), lung function (spirometry), lung inflammation (sputum induction) and systemic inflammation (blood cell counts and circulating cytokines) were collected.…”

Natural and technologic hazardous material releases during and after natural disasters: a review

“…Chemical containers lost off the coast of France during a storm were recovered in Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany (PANNA, 2003;Simons, 1993). Smoke pollution from Indonesian wildfires spread as far as Kuala Lumpur on the west side of the Malay peninsula and rose to unhealthy levels in Singapore (Swinbanks, 1997), where outpatient attendance for haze-related conditions such as upper respiratory tract illness and asthma increased by 30% (Emmanuel, 2000).…”

“…Smoke containing hazardous levels of ozone, nitrogen dioxide, sulfur dioxide, carbon dioxide and particulate matter resulted in at least 8000 hospital admissions in Malaysia during the 1997 Indonesian forest fires (Swinbanks, 1997). Hospital emergency department visits of persons with asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease significantly increased during the major forest fire activity in California during 1987.…”