Editor:
The Sunshine Coast Clean Air Society (SCCAS) would like to thank Nina Haedrich for her recent letter to the editor about excessive dust in the Sechelt area and her concerns about its health effects. Dust is part of the family of particulates, which we breathe every day.
Breathing particulate matter (PM) is a health hazard especially for children and others suffering from asthma and other chronic lung diseases. As well as exasperating chronic lung problems, long-term exposure to PM is causally linked with lung cancers, emphysema, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and cardio vascular disease.
Exposure to smoke, whether it originates from cigarettes, back yard burning or other sources, is often the culprit. Living near freeways or garbage incinerators has also been associated with higher incidences of heart and lung disease.
Air quality health experts have found that smaller particulates are more dangerous than larger ones because they are able to penetrate deeper into the lungs. Air monitoring has traditionally sampled particles smaller than 10 microns, but now standard sampling has become 2.5 microns and smaller. A human hair measures between 25 and 50 microns, and a sheet of paper about 100. Exhaust from diesel trucks is generally smaller than 2.5 microns and considered quite harmful.
Dust is mostly composed of coarse particulates larger than 2.5 microns. As such it is not considered as dangerous to human health as finer ones are. Nevertheless, dust can be an eye and throat irritant as well a nuisance when it settles on our furniture and other surfaces.
At the request of the citizens of East Porpoise Bay, the SCCAS asked the provincial Ministry of the Environment to establish a monitoring program in the area. Regular monitoring of PM2.5 and PM10 started in Porpoise Bay in early 2013.
Louis Legal, director, SCCAS
