bushfire smoke
Bushfire smoke can harm your health, especially if you live with a lung disease (like asthma), live with another long-term illness (like heart disease and diabetes), are over 65 or a child under 5, or are pregnant. The best ways to avoid smoke are to: Close doors and windows to help protect you during short episodes of outdoor smoke, wear a P2/N95 mask outdoors and indoors if needed, use an air cleaner with a HEPA filter indoors, check local air quality using a trusted app (e.g. AirRater), and think about visiting a place with cleaner air like a library or a shopping centre.
As Australians, we think about landscape fires primarily in terms of bushfire disasters. But this is only part of the picture. In this webinar Fay Johnston, Director of the Centre for Safe Air and Professor at the Menzies Institute for Medical Research, presented a lecture titled: Climate change, landscape fires, and human health: understanding fire phenotypes. A newly published global synthesis led by Professor Johnston describes seven ‘phenotypes’ of landscape fire around the world, each with distinct patterns in their health and environmental impacts. In this talk, Professor Johnston explains how a more nuanced model of landscape fire can help us to design interventions at individual, community, and regional levels to maximise the benefits and minimise the harms associated with fire in the landscape. Dr Amanda Wheeler chaired the session and moderated an open discussion on the subject.
Smoke is an important health risk associated with bushfires. Here is what you can do before, during and after a bushfire to stay safe.
We've updated our factsheet on the health impacts of bushfire smoke to incorporate practical considerations to protect yourself from bushfire smoke during the COVID-19 pandemic.
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