Asthma and Air Pollution
By: Advait Chutke - 3
Pollution. More specifically, Air Pollution. You may have heard of Air Pollution on the news nowadays, and mainly its effects on the planet. Air Pollution can be described as, “A by-product of urbanization and industrialization.” (Hannah Ritchie) and can contain a plethora of pollutant compounds like: sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, particulate matter, and volatile organic compounds. These pollutants are created from the consumption and use of fossil fuels, creation and destruction of man-made objects, and from an ecosystem in itself. The effects and consequences of these you may have heard of, like global warming. But you may have not known that an effect of Air Pollution goes directly to humans, by helping cause Asthma.
Asthma, a respiratory condition in which a person’s respiratory airways leading to or in the lungs swell, narrow, and produce mucus to cause a difficulty in breathing. Asthma’s effects vary person to person, and the causes of it vary as well. Air Pollution helps cause Asthma by “suppressing genes that regulate the immune system’s ability to differentiate an allergen from a dangerous foreign substance, such as a virus or bacteria” (epa.gov). The immune system in the body reacts to the allergen or pollutant by sending an inflammatory response and closing the respiratory tract. The pollutants literally mess with the genes within DNA and RNA to cause the body to react differently than it should, causing Asthma. The pollutants also irritate Asthma afterwards causing deadly Asthma Attacks and cause breathing problems in day to day life.
I personally have had Asthma and still have it to this day. It affects me less today, but used to be a big struggle in the past. I used to have to take an inhaler almost everyday because numerous pollutants would agitate my lungs and force them to close up. Whenever I go to a very polluted area (some big cities or factory districts) I tend to start coughing and start to have difficulty breathing. Many people in the world suffer from Asthma as well, only to have the pollutants harm or agitate them as well. I believe that we should tone down what we burn and try to figure out ways to clean up the air for everyone to breathe better and live better.
There are ways to help decrease the pollutants in the air. We can use less fossil fuels to decrease some of the harmful pollutants. We can ask and help fun filter towers like the one in China (depicted above). And also by simply using your car less. These steps, small and big, can help decrease the amount of pollutants in the atmosphere. Pollutants which cause harm to the environment and the people within.
Questions…
What do you think about pollution’s additional affect to the Human Body?
What are you going to do to help decrease the amount of pollutants?
What do you think it feels like to live with Asthma and what do you thing you would have to do different in your daily life to cope with it?
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18 comments:
I was surprised by the fact that pollutants suppress genes that regulate the immune system’s ability to differentiate the allergens from a foreign substance. I was unaware that it actually affects our DNA and RNA. This makes pollution and respiratory a positive feedback loop. As the human population grows, more fossil fuels are being used which causes pollution. This pollution then leads to respiratory problems, and so on. Thus, it is critical that we take action and undo the effects of fossil fuel combustion and pollution.
The fact that humans are causing problems not only to the environment but to ourselves as well is ironic. It is saddening to see that we would do anything that could harm the environment and even ourselves. To help with this, I will try to use my car less and walk to distances that are easily walkable. Commercial airlines are a huge contributor to air pollution, so I will reduce the amount of plane rides I take. While I have not experienced Asthma, I know how hard it is to manage with by witnessing my family members go through it. Air pollution contributing to this and making these conditions worse should not be acceptable, so it is essential we reduce air pollution by cutting down damaging materials and machines.
I was suprised at the fact that pollution can cause genetic mutations in the human body, and that it causes asthma. Our impact on the Earth is starting to effect ourself now, essentially the Earth is trying to fight back here. What also suprised me is that air pollution can cause other issues as well, such as the premature aging of lungs, diseases such as emphysema and even cancer, or even the extreme of a shortened lifespan. Pollution is beginning to severely effect the environment, and humans should being to slow this. Personally, air pollution is difficult and expensive to stop, but as a large group, humans can band together and stop the burning of fossil fuels and the use of gasoline cars. If I were to be living with asthma, this is a problem that would cause more trouble and must be stopped.
Personally, I am deeply disturbed that an unprecedented number of people, including myself, do not have the slightest idea of the effects of pollutants to patients of asthma. When considering the effects of pollution in our environment, most people tend to jump to the long term and don’t stop to see how pollutants affect us today. We imagine a world that no longer directly relates to everyone currently on the planet, and that is not right. There are people whose lives have been deeply scarred by this seemingly unstoppable issue. It is time we bring more argument, such as that of asthma, to the table when regarding environmental politics to show the world the great urgency to find a solution.
As someone who also has asthma, I am aware of the effects that pollution has on the human body. I think that we should be taking better care of our Earth, and not polluting it. This would not only benefit the environment, but ourselves also. One thing that I can do is to carpool. Instead of all my friends driving separately somewhere, we can choose to ride together to help decrease the amount of pollution. I know what it is like to live with asthma, and it is difficult. I would always have to have my inhaler on me at all times, and watch where I went in fear of not being able to breathe. I have outgrown asthma, and haven’t had to use my inhaler in years, but I can still remember what it was like not being able to breathe in certain situations.
Yeah not being able to breathe sucks and having to always carry a little inhaler sounds annoying. I can’t even keep up with my wallet. Throughout reading this blog I was surprised at how many pollutants can get caught in our air. The idea of the air we need to breathe becoming harmful to us sounds pretty morbid. Moreover Air pollution is very similar to water pollution in the sense that it can spread and affect the world miles away from the origin. This is a very big problem. How i would like two help with this problem is by buying and using electric products that do not need to use fossil fuels. Products like Tesla and other electric brands are going to make the world a little more greener.
In addition to making asthma worse, pollution has also led to allergies being worse. The introduction of greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere has led to warmer temperatures, and longer growing seasons. These longer growing seasons mean that allergy producing plants are able to grow for more time each year, and produce more of their dastardly substances. This destroys those of us who already struggled with bad allergies. For me, March, April, and September consist of constant coughing, itchy throat and eyes, and sneezing. This is similar to asthma, as the environment changing directly makes your health worse.
pollution has affected our society greatly and other cases but not being able to breathe sucks.i would help get rid of factories that emit gases that ruin the air in big cities and other places.It would suck to have asthma because you would have to carry your inhaler and if you don’t have your inhaler in cases you can have a asthma attack whenever which is scary.i would just carry around my inhaler and act like a normal person
I am surprised to hear that pollution contributes to asthma. Although I am well aware that pollutants contribute to greenhouse gases and an overall health detriment to animals, it never occurred to me the direct effect it has on humans. I have never experienced something like asthma but I can imagine it is tough to deal with. This is yet another reasons why humans need to regulate the pollution they create. Smoke from factories and cars must be regulated and limited, so that these health risks are alleviated.
I was surprised that air pollution can cause consequences in the human body such as asthma which is a respiratory condition of difficulty of breathing. I want to help decrease the amount of pollutants by biking or walking to one place to another instead of using my car for transportation. I have experienced asthma when I was a younger, but now I don’t have the condition anymore. It felt like I couldn’t breathe after I exercised or did anything with my friends, and I always had to take my inhaler everywhere to maintain my breathing. It is essential to be cautious and make sure we limit ourselves of using machines or transportation such as cars, trains, and airplanes.
I am not surprised by the fact that air pollution can cause and irritate asthma, especially after we have tackled that breathing in particles (ex.smoking) can harm our lungs. Humans don't realize that when we harm the environment we harm ourselves and we will increase asthma and lung cancer rates. At this point we have to excessively reduce our emissions. We should invest in public transportation such as high speed rail and regular trains throughout the country. We also have to invest more in electric cars.
Although the pollution should not exist, I believe our bodies have well adapted to the excess allergens and harmful contents in the air. For instance, as a child, I had almost fatal asthma attacks almost every month. However, at 17, my asthma is more in control. To decrease the amount of pollutants, I think it's important to go to corporations themselves, especially those who have factories. It would be beneficial to urge them to use clean energy rather than ones that emit harmful gasses in the atmosphere. Living with asthma is not an easy task. In large cities, it is often difficult to breathe when there's smoke. However, spending more time outdoors around trees, etc has helped me greatly. Now I am able to run longer and work harder without having a fatal situation.
I didn’t realize how much pollution affects people with asthma because I never experienced it myself. When I think of pollution, I think about how it affects the environment not how it affects the human body itself. The increase in pollutants in the air contributes to respiratory problems that could lead to long term effects. With these changes in the environment; the air around us will also only get worse and damage our health even more.
I have asthma and this is very interesting to me. My asthma does not prevent me from living my life, but when it gets bad I get a bad cough. I never linked pollution to asthma, but after reading this it seems logical. Pollution makes the air quality poor which would make asthma worse. The human body was not meant to take in bad air and humans need to stop creating bad air. Companies need to be regulated by how much they can put into the air so that it does not effect the communities around them. I think it wold be interesting to study multiple towns with air pollution and how it changes the lives of those with asthma on multiple different levels. Humans need to take care of the air in order to survive.
I actually had asthma when I was younger and even though I eventually grew out of it, I still remember the numerous doctor visits that I would have to deal with my asthma. There are various things that we can do, and we should start off with limiting the usage of items that will increase air pollution such as cars, bikes and planes and start cleaning the air out with the air cleaner in places such as so that way the amount of air pollution produced will be impacted in those two different ways, reducing the amount just in case if one way doesn’t prove to be effective.
I’m surprised at the fact that the pollution that we cause everyday is causing people around the world to suffer from asthma. Some people even die from asma, which is in a way our fault. We should be responsible for those people who are suffering from asthma. We should try to stop pollution from spreading due to the serious side effects. We should develop new technology in order to combat the difficulties of pollution.
I was surprised that it has an impact on people with asthma. I would start driving less, maybe get a Tesla. I also think it would be beneficial for big companies to be more sustainable and not release too many potants. I personally don’t have asthma, and don’t know what it’s like to have it. My little brother though, had asthma when we was younger due to my aunt smoking in the car with him. Those toxins had a horrible effect on him. He had to do breathing treatments and use an inhaler while excercising. If people with asthma have to do things linke this because of our air quality, before we know it, all humans will have to also.
It’s interesting to know that when we harm the environment, it comes to bite us back. In this era, we are so accustomed to driving and using fossil fuels, it can be hard to reduce our car usage. However, there are many ways to reduce our impact. For example, carpooling and public transportation can help reduce carbon emissions since not everyone is taking their own car to the same destinations. Electric cars are also one way to reduce air pollution. Electric cars are starting to become more affordable and efficient, making it ideal over regular cars.
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