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CNN Live Today
Half of Americans Breathe Hazardous Air Pollution
Aired May 01, 2002 - 10:12 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
DARYN KAGAN, CNN ANCHOR: We move here to the U.S. and something that deals with all of us, and that is dirty air. The danger could be as close as your next breath.
The American Lung Association has issued its annual State of the Air report. More than 100 million Americans have reason to be concerned.
Our environment correspondent Natalie Pawelski tells us who and why and where.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
NATALIE PAWELSKI, CNN ENVIRONMENT CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): From coast to smoggy coast, half of all Americans are living dangerously in places where air pollution levels, the report says, can be hazardous to your health.
JOHN KIRKWOOD, PRESIDENT & CEO, AMERICAN LUNG ASSOCIATION: There actually has been an increase of about 18 percent in the areas that are rated an F, which is unhealthy.
PAWELSKI: For the third year in a row, the four smoggiest cities are in California: L.A., Bakersfield, Fresno and Visalia. Houston, Texas came in fifth. Atlanta ranked sixth, followed by Merced, California Knoxville, Tennessee, Charlotte, North Carolina and Sacramento.
All of these cities scored Fs for ground level ozone. Note most on the list are hot and sunny. Start with the pollution most cities have. Nitrogen oxides and hydrocarbons from tail pipe emissions and smoke stack pollution, mix in the heat and the sunlight, and you get ozone. That's the main ingredient in smog.
Ozone is especially dangerous for people with asthma, children and the elderly.
KIRKWOOD: Because ozone is an irritant. It is like getting a sunburn on your airways, and that affects everyone.
PAWELSKI: But some Americans are breathing relatively freely in cities that earned an A, suffering no smog alerts from 1998 through 2000. That list includes Bellingham, Washington, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Duluth, Minnesota, Fargo, North Dakota and Flagstaff, Arizona. Also on that clean list, Honolulu, Laredo, Texas, Lincoln, Nebraska, McAllen, Texas, Salinas, California and Spokane, Washington.
Some of these cities are relatively low smog, because of climate or geography. Others have less traffic or fewer industrial sources of pollution.
KIRKWOOD: You can't do anything about the weather and topography. What you have you to address are the sources of hydrocarbon and nitrogen oxide emissions.
PAWELSKI: Cleaning up the sources of that pollution from the plants that power homes and businesses to the tailpipes on America's increasingly crowded roads will not be easy.
(on camera): Case in point, right here in Atlanta, one of the sprawl capitals of the universe, and Atlantans drive more miles than almost any other Americans. All of that traffic means a lot of pollution, and our climate, which is usually pretty hot and sunny, that can gets baked into a lot of smog. And efforts to get Atlantans out of their cars and into mass transit and into car pools haven't made much of a dent, one example of one city of what cities across the country are trying to do to battle the smog problems.
Natalie Pawelski, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
KAGAN: Natalie, thank you very much.
Well, the smog-related health risks are especially acute for the old and the young.
And joining us to discuss the medial effects of air pollution, our medical correspondent, Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Good morning.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Daryn.
KAGAN: When you look at that haze that you see Natalie standing under, what does that tell you medically?
GUPTA: I'll tell you, you can just look at it and the air is bad, no question. But some of the worst things actually are things you can't see at all, ozone we are talking about. And these can do some very specific things to the lungs. This is something that has been researched a lot over the last several years.
Damages of lungs just de novo actually will get in there and damage the bronchial, the things that allow air to pass through your lungs. It damages them. Someone mentioning there, it's like looking at the lungs as if they have got a sunburn. That's a good way of thinking about it.
If you already have lung disease, such as asthma or obstructive pulmonary disease or something like that, you are a high candidate for getting even worse. And these are certainly people that have to be watched out for.
Children, Daryn, are particularly vulnerable, especially because they exercise so much, so their air intake is much greater, and also they are outside during the worst months, May through September. Those are the worst months.
And certainly the elderly as well, as you get older, your air capacity diminishes, so what little air capacity you do have becomes even greater targeted by this ozone and other smut and all of that sort of stuff out there.
KAGAN: Smut. I love that. Well, this takes a flashback to my childhood in L.A. And one I remember we would have smog alert days, so that meant no recess or they would cancel all sports activities. But I do remember playing outside on a smoggy day, and at the end of the day, you would breath in and like there would be this really tight feeling in your lungs, in your chest. What was physically happening?
GUPTA: Yes, that's classic -- exactly right. The ozone or other sort of particles get down into the base of your lungs, and it can make it difficult for to you breathe. But it can also make it difficult for your body to actually get the oxygen from the lungs, because it's getting all clogged up, so the body can't actually extract that oxygen. That can cause pain. In a kid, not as big a deal, but you can imagine somebody who probably has heart disease or lung disease, it can really tip them over the edge with something like that.
KAGAN: And so stay indoors on days like that, I guess, is the most can you do.
GUPTA: Yes -- right. It's tough to give advice on something like this. Obviously, you decrease pollution. We have been hearing about that for years, trying, you know, to conform to the clean air standards that we have been hearing about.
But there is some good news. Here in Atlanta in '96, they actually did have a strong push towards public transportation during the Olympics, and they saw a precipitous decrease in ozone concentrations much lower than expected, and with that, a decrease in hospitalizations, ER visits and all sorts of admissions for respiratory problems. So it is possible.
Stay indoors though. May through September are the worst. If it is hot outside, a lot of sunlight, that makes it the worst time of day as well.
KAGAN: Good advice. Dr. Sanjay Gupta, thank you.
GUPTA: See you, Daryn.
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