I didn't mention this on Thursday, when I wrote my last post, because I felt like writing about something else, but we also received some bad news on that day. A friend that we know from church has been informed that he is dying. He has had Congestive Heart Failure for quite some time and yet has continued to be basically Ok. Unfortunately, with all the smoke that we have had in the air because of all the fires, our friend's Congestive Heart Failure has moved into the next phase and he's been told that he is dying.
Well, yeh, he's dying of Congestive Heart Failure, but you know what? He has been living with that now for several years and was basically Ok, until all these fires started and the air has not been clear, so I figure that the smoke has taken away some of his remaining time on this earth.
We felt the same way about our dog, Casper. He basically died of lung cancer, but how much more time would he have had if there had not been so much smoke? He died pretty fast as far as I'm concerned. Once he had that one seizure, he was gone in 10 days. Prior to the seizure, he had been coughing a little, but was quite energetic and appeared pretty healthy.
It's just like when ever there is a major heat wave, there are some casualties. The healthy handle it just fine, but the elderly and those with health problems can die from a heat stroke. The same is true of smoke. It can kill those who have respiratory problems. These are the casualties that are not reported.
The smoke was so bad on Thursday that we couldn't see very far. My husband and I had not been wearing masks, but on this day, we did. Yesterday and today, it was a little better.
7 comments:
Maybe health related evacuations should be made for people with healthy risks, so such tragedies can be avoided.
Sorry to hear about your friend.
Yeh, maybe so, yet part of the problem is that they were using a swamp cooler. Unfortunately, such pulls air from outside, so it does not work too well as a filter. They were told to buy a regular air conditioner, but by that time it was too late.
In my part of the country, it has been an accepted practice for farmers to burn their fields. For
some crops, this is an efficient
method of weed control and no-till
operation. This has led to a battle between ag interests and the health community, lawsuits etc.
Asthmatics in particular suffer from smokey air, as well as the elderly, and as you note, those
with cardiopulminary disease. As an old pipe smoker, I have been
scolded for 'second hand smoke'
increasingly through the years.
My guess is that even healthy
people, exposed to dense particulate smoke like you have,
may suffer some. Can't imagine
running a marathon breathing that stuff....
There are farmers in our area that burn as well. I guess it's mostly the rice farmers. The smoke created from that is minor in comparison to the smoke created by these fires. We have a lot of elderly in our area who use oxygen. I have no idea how many such casualties there were. There were obviously some such patients that are still doing Ok.
As to the healthy. I heard some people complain because they could feel it in their chests. It mainly just gave me a head ache. The ones who suffered the most were the one's without the proper filtering air conditioners in their home. Swamp coolers are no good for this and of course some people have no air conditioners at all.
When the air condition is really bad, they would give warnings that people should stay indoors. People would walk around with those painter's masks on. Ray and I usually didn't, but on this one day when it was really bad, we did wear them while we did some brief work outside. After while they are uncomfortable and make your face hot, but they do the trick and keeping the smoke out.
Here's another response to both Beth and BB-Idaho.
Beth said, "Maybe health related evacuations should be made for people with health risks."
On another post, BB said, "From the news, it looks as though the whole north of the state is aflame...is there a safe area to evacuate to?"
BB's comment made me laugh at first, yet you know what? When it comes to smoke there was no place to evacuate to, for the smoke filled the air for miles and miles and miles.
I can't imagine all that you and your neighbors in the communities around you have had to deal with. Just glad you are still posting comments so we know you and your home are still okay!
Last I heard, the fire in our area was 70% contained and they have once again sent all the out of area fire fighters either home or to other fires and they have finally removed all the Precautionary Evacuation Notices including ours, yet I'm a little reluctant to unpack, since I've already done so twice and each time I had to go right back and pack it up again. This will be the third time for unpacking. Maybe I'll start windling at it later this evening, slowly this time.
The air has been better. So much so, that I actually turned the fan on last night instead of the airconditioner and it seemed alright.
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