Photo: Aurelia Ventura / Real America News
For: Manuel Ocaño / Special for Real America News Updated 21 Apr 2022, 22: 44 pm EDT
The American Lung Association has just released its annual report on air quality and its message is quite clear: “If you live in Los Angeles County, the air you breathe can put their health is at risk”.
The association grades, as in schools, the air quality in each city and area of the country, and for Los Angeles it has an “F” rating for ozone, “F” for particulate pollution 24 hours of the day, and “failed” in pollution throughout the year.
The “State of the Air”, or report on the condition of air quality in the United States in 2022 says that the five Metropolitan areas with the worst air quality are all in the state of California, with Los Angeles ranking fifth nationally.
The five metropolitan areas with the thinnest air ozone producers are Bakersfield first, then Fresno, Visalia, urban San Jose, San Francisco, and Oakland; and fifth in the country, Los Angeles along with Long Beach.
For Los Angeles this translates to 143 thousand cases of pediatric asthma and 737 thousand 55 of asthma between adults, according to the American Lung Association 2022.
Also translates in Los Angeles to 414 one thousand cases of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, 3, 372 cases of lung cancer, more than half a million cases of cardiovascular diseases, affects 109 thousand pregnancies.
Much like the impact of the pandemic, air pollution in Los Angeles hits the poor and members of ethnic minorities the hardest.
The association says that air pollution impacts one million 289 thousand residents from Los Angeles they are poor, already 7 million 372 thousand 841 people of color in Los Angeles.
The State of the Air report says that “communities discriminated against on racial or ethnic grounds suffer disproportionately from exposure to unhealthy air.”080916
The report found that these people were 61 percent more likely than whites to live in a county with a failing rating for at least one pollutant, and 3.6 times more likely to live in a county with a failing rating for all three pollutants.
Although the situation is clearly difficult for many Angelenos, experts recommend taking action from individuals and families, even by governments , including federal.
Every Los Angeles resident you can check daily air quality forecasts for your region, which are often presented alongside weather forecasts, you can also protect yourself from wildfire smoke, and reduce your own contributions to air pollution.
For example, “prioritize walking, biking, and public transportation over gasoline-powered vehicles. Conserve electricity and buy your energy from clean, non-combustion sources if you can. Do not burn wood, leaves or garbage”, says the association.
The State of the Air of 2022 warns that “more than 137 Millions of people in the United States live in counties that had unhealthy levels of pollution with particulate pollutants or ozone.”080916
In total, some 63.2 million people lived in counties that got an F for unhealthy spikes in particulate pollution. The particles are microscopic and, due to their size, they enter the lungs with almost no obstacles.
Of the entire country, four of the five regions most polluted with particles in short periods of time are also in California. They are, in that order, Fresno, Bakersfield, Fairbanks in the state of Arkansas, and then again in California in San José-San Francisco and in Reddings-Red Bluff.
The American Lung Association also mentions in its annual report the ten cities with the best air quality in the country, but none of them are in the state of California.
Additionally, the report says that the more pollution there is, the more fires, and with them more pollution as in a vicious circle.
“This year’s report maintains that climate change is degrading air quality in the United States. Rising temperatures and other effects related to climate change contribute to more intense wildfires, and also make ozone air pollution more likely to form,” the report says.
In his conclusion he says that he “calls on the Biden administration to strengthen both short-term and year-round national limits on air pollution. Stronger parameters would educate the public about the levels of air pollution that threaten their health.”