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Tag: asthma

Smoke from Canada’s wildfires killed nine-year-old Carter Vigh – and 82,000 others around the world

Amber Vigh had taken the usual precautions when bringing her nine-year-old son, Carter, to summer camp in July 2023. There were no fires near their home in British Columbia, Canada. Her air quality app showed low levels of pollution. She could not smell any smoke.

Carter, a music-loving Lego enthusiast who had asthma, brought along his smiling shark tooth-patterned emergency kit that held an inhaler, allergy pill and EpiPen. When smoke did roll in from the north, Vigh took him indoors.

But at home that evening, Carter began to cough uncontrollably. Vigh and her husband, James, followed the doctors’ checklist – emergency inhaler, drink of water, steroid inhaler – and gave him a bath to cool down. Then, “all of a sudden, he started coughing again like crazy”, said Vigh.

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What’s all this wildfire smoke doing to your health? Here’s what experts have to say

People who breathe air polluted with large amounts of wildfire smoke visit hospital emergency rooms more often for respiratory symptoms, according to a Canadian emergency room physician and chair of the Global Climate and Health Alliance.

Rates of heart attack and cardiac arrest also increase after a couple of days of exposure, Dr. Courtney Howard said.

“So don’t just attribute that feeling of heaviness in your chest to asthma,” said Howard, who works in Yellowknife and is president of the Northwest Territories Medical Association.

“If you have other risk factors for cardiovascular disease especially, go see your friendly local emergency department.”

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Air Pollution Is Really Dangerous, Even More New Evidence Shows

PM2.5 particles are tiny enough to enter the bloodstream and lodge in the lungs, where they contribute to respiratory problems such as asthma. They also can prompt heart attacks and strokes. And they have been linked to diabetes, obesity and dementia and may exacerbate COVID.

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Long COVID linked to allergies in new study

In an analysis of 13 published prospective studies of people of all ages with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection who were followed up for at least 12 months, pre-existing allergic conditions were linked to higher risks of experiencing long COVID, according to a study today in Clinical & Experimental Allergy.

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