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Background Information
Millions of Americans live in
areas where the air carries oxygen as well as noxious pollutants that
reach unhealthful levels, such as ozone, carbon monoxide, fine particles,
sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide, or lead.
Exercise makes us more
vulnerable to health damage from these pollutants. We breathe more air
during exercise or strenuous work. We draw air more deeply into the lungs.
And when we exercise heavily, we breathe mostly through the mouth, bypassing
the body's first line of defense against pollution, the nose.
How Air
Pollution Affects Your Body
Oxygen is
necessary for our muscles to function. In fact, the purpose of exercise
training is to improve the body's ability to deliver oxygen. As a result,
when we exercise, we may increase our intake of air by as much as ten times
our level at rest.
An
endurance athlete can process as much as twenty times the normal intake.
Mouth breathing during exercise bypasses the nasal passages, the body's
natural air filter.
These facts mean that when we
exercise in polluted air, we increase our contact with the pollutants, and
increase our vulnerability to health damage.
Children: A
Special Risk
Children are
especially vulnerable to pollution-caused lung problems during exercise
because:
For their size they breathe more, and
faster, than adults.
They are more active and more likely to play
outdoors.
Like adults during exercise, mouth breathing is
common.
Sports and outdoor activity at school are most
likely to occur when smog levels are highest.
Children may be more susceptible to the effects
of some air pollutants because their lungs are still developing.
Young lungs are still developing, and air
pollution may cause or contribute to the development of chronic lung
diseases.
Caution For Children
When ozone levels reach a national PSI level of 200 (0.20 parts per
million), exercising children outdoors experience respiratory irritation and
a decline in lung function. Therefore, they should avoid calisthenics,
soccer, tag, running, competitive swimming, basketball, tennis and other
strenuous exercise outdoors.
Substitute activities
considered safer include recreational swimming, archery, swings and
horseback riding.
Should the ozone level reach a national
PSI reading of 235 (0.275 ppm), all outdoor
sports and games involving physical activity should be suspended as
significant respiratory tract irritation is likely to occur at this ozone
level.
LEARN THE DO'S AND DON'TS
If you live in an area susceptible to air pollution, here's what you should
do:
Do train early in the day or in the evening.
Do avoid midday
or afternoon exercise, and avoid strenuous outdoor work, if possible, when
ozone smog or other pollution levels are high.
Do avoid congested streets and rush hour
traffic; pollution levels can be high up to 50 feet from the roadway.
Do make sure teachers, coaches and recreation
officials know about air pollution and act accordingly.
Most importantly, do be aware of the quality of
the air you breathe!
Don't do the following:
Don't take air pollution lightly,
it can hurt all of us!
Don't engage in strenuous
outdoor activity when local officials issue health warnings.
http://www.lungusa.org/air/envairpolex.html
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