Health experts Mahdieh Danesh Yazdi and Nozomi Sasaki look at how climate change is increasing wildfire smoke exposure and related health risks. Host Heather Lynch, as well as Danesh Yazdi and Sasaki from Program in Public Health at Stony Brook University, discuss evidence linking airborne particles to increased mortality and cardiopulmonary impacts. They point to growing research, using large administrative datasets and local hospital data to assess impacts, that suggests wildfire smoke is more harmful than other pollution sources.

Learn more with: 

• “Long-term Effect of Exposure to Lower Concentrations of Air Pollution on Mortality among Medicare Participants and Vulnerable Subgroups,” by Mahdieh Danesh Yazdi, Yan Wang, Qian Di, Weeber J. Requia, Yaguang Wei, and Liuhua Shi
• “Associations between air pollution and psychiatric symptoms in the normative aging study,” by Xinye Qiu, Mahdieh Danesh Yazdi, Marc Weisskopf, Anna Kosheleva, Avron Spiro, Cuicui Wang, Brent A. Coull, Petros Koutrakis and Joel D. Schwartz
• “Emulating causal doseresponse relations between air pollutants and mortality in the Medicare population,” by Yaguang Wei, Mahdieh Danesh Yazdi, Qian Di, Weeberb J. Requia, Francesca Dominici, Antonella Zanobetti and Joel Schwartz
• “Fish consumption and omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids from diet are positively associated with cognitive function in older adults even in the presence of exposure to lead, cadmium, selenium, and methylmercury: a cross-sectional study using NHANES 2011–2014 data,” by Nozomi Sasaki, Laura E. Jones and David O. Carpenter

Skip ahead to the chapter that interests you:

• 01:34 Air Pollution and Mortality
• 10:56 Environmental Justice and Work
• 22:01 Who Is Most Vulnerable
• 28:57 Short vs Long Effects
• 30:12 Heavy Metals in Smoke
• 35:56 Fish Mercury Tradeoffs
• 41:28 Practical Air Tips
• 44:33 EVs and Hidden Costs

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C4E Presents is a production of Stony Brook’s Collaborative for the Earth.

Host: Heather Lynch

Editor: J.D. Allen

Producer: Jordan Vallone

Program Manager: Jennifer Gilday