t's not just L.A. any more. Three out of every four Americans now breathe air so dirty it threatens the health of children, the elderly, and even outdoor joggers.

The American Lung Association's annual State of the Air report card gave an F in air quality to nearly 400 U. S. counties ­ a 15% increase since the previous report. And don't breathe a big sigh of relief if you don't live in a big city. Many of the regions that flunk healthy­air standards are medium and small metropolitan areas.

"It is of concern to us because a large percent age of the counties in the U.S. are experiencing unhealthy air," said Norman H. Edelman, MD. "There are things we can do about it, and we have to be ever vigilant. It is bad for everybody but especially bad for people with chronic lung disease and people with asthma." Edelman, dean of the president for the SUNY-Stony Brook School of Medicine and vice president of the SUNY Health Science Center, serves as scientific consultant to the American Lung Association.

More than 141 million U.S. residents live in areas with unhealthy amounts of ozone in the air ­ nine million more than last report. And that's only counting areas where ozone has been measured for at least three years. Nearly 60% of places where ozone is monitored get the failing grade.

The grading system is based on the number of days an area has ozone levels that are unhealthy for sensitive people, unhealthy for all people, or very unhealthy for all people. A score of 3.3 is a failing grade ­ but places on the 10­worst list are far worse:

1.     Los Angeles­Riverside­Orange County, CA;
2.     Bakersfield, CA;
3.     Fresno, CA;
4.    Visalia-Tulare­Porterville, CA;
5.    Houston­ Galveston­ Brazoria, TX;
6.    Atlanta, GA;
7.    Washington, DC­ Baltimore, MD;
8.    Charlotte­Gastonia­Rock Hill, NC­SC;
9.    Knoxville, TN; and
10.    Philadelphia­Wilmington­Atlantic City, PA ­ Del. ­ NJ ­­ tied with Raleigh ­ Durham ­ Chapel Hill, NC.

For people who like better air, there were 12 metropolitan areas without any bad­air days at all: Bellingham, WA; Colorado Springs, CO; Des Moines, IA; and Duluth, MN, got perfect scores two years in a row.

The rest of the cities making the good breathing list were:

1.    Fargo­Moorhead, N.D.­MN;
2.    FLagstaff, Ariz.­Utah [sic];
3.    Honolulu, HI;
4.    Laredo, TX;
5.    Lincoln, NE;
6.    McAllen Edinburg­Mission, TX;
7.    Salinas, CA; and
8.    Spokane, WA.

But a small town is no guarantee of safe air. Small cities like Lancaster, PA, and Redding, CA, also have smog­filled air.

Jonathan M. Samet, MD, professor and chair of the department of epidemiology at Johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health, leads a research team that recently linked increases in air pollution to increased deaths in 20 U.S. cities. This research focused on tiny particles in air pollution ­ but Samet says ozone is a similar danger.

"The evidence is suggestive that ozone also increases mortality in addition to the effect seen for particles," said Samet. "One of the main questions is the effect of ozone on large populations. The questions are about long­term effects."

Ozone is released when sunlight hits the fumes emitted by the fuel­burning engines of diesel machinery, trucks, and, of course, cars. Researchers recently found that ozone and small particles of contaminants actually can constrict the circulation of blood in the lungs. But that's not all. When you breathe ozone, it can burn the sensitive lung tissue.

*(Some other thoughts I am adding to this article. Industry that does any fossil fuel burning including power plants and so forth cause the same fumes but in the case of Natural Gas Power plants, I personally was a intervenor in some California Siting cases, "CEC Docket #'s 98-AFC-1c, 98-AFC-3, & 00-AFC-1", and learned that one of the largest emissions they release is Formaldehyde which also causes the burning of the lungs without you knowing it. The particulate matter or PM of natural gas when burned is less than 1 micron in size which means that it can cause cellular damage and your cell will not trigger a immune response. The immune response begins to happen when your body detects your cells as foreign to the body and then a autoimmune response will occur. Once it has reached that stage you can not shut it off. Natural Gas is not clean energy or fuel as they have been advertising and in California that is against Voter Approved Proposition 65 to not inform people of this fact. I have in the past Informed PG&E of that fact but they have not conformed to what I told them. They continue to send out a Proposition 65 letter that does not say that on it. I thought you might like to know this since this article seemed to omit that fact.)

"It's like getting a superficial burn of your airways," Edelman says. "It can cause chest tightness, pain, and difficulty breathing ­ it depends on how much you breathe in and how sensitive you are. But runners who run at high ozone levels, or even in normal kids who camp out, get more symptoms when ozone levels are higher."

What can you do about it?

"As individuals we can go inside, exercise in the morning rather than midday, keep children inside in unhealthy areas on unhealthy days, and make sure patients with emphysema and asthma live in environments ­ and that really means air conditioning ­ where they are protected," Edelman says. "As a people we can support stringent air standards ­ and, most importantly, enforcement of these standards."

Over the past 20 years, ozone levels actually have gone down. But a new trend of increasing ozone now appears to be underway.

"I think if we had a public policy that encouraged use of fuel efficient cars we would then start to reduce air pollution again," Edelman says. "We went through this good period when everybody was concerned and conserving, but we have moved far away from that. Those SUVs we all drive are gas guzzlers."

If you would like to find out how your community rates, go to http://www.stateoftheair.org.

• this section I added into this article because I personally have done legal work concerning this issue as a intervenor. I presented the study concerning the tiny particulate matter as brought out in the Newspaper, the Contra Costa Times, years ago to the California Energy Commission or CEC but they ignored it all as hearsay. Now more are seeing it is not hearsay after all. Makes you wonder who these people are working for though. It sure was not the public and the poor and minority communities because that is right where they stuck the first two power plants. Not less than 1 mile from each other in the middle of minority and the poor or low income including a HUD housing community of the El Pueblo District in Pittsburg, CA. One other thought. Ozone has not lessened. The amount of ozone has increased in California. It is less per car but not less according to the air studies. The population has shoot far way up in California thus meaning far more cars. Also the Bay Area Air Quality Management District or BAAQMD only monitors each site around once every 11 days for air samples. That is what I was told as a intervenor. Which means that all the local industry can pollute heavily for the other 10 days before they collect their sample. We have to many spare the air days to say pollution and especially ozone levels has gone down. That is what they monitor at the weather stations is the Ozone levels for calling for Spare the Air Days. In the winter the sun can not react with the other chemicals in the air so you may have less ozone but you have far more chemicals in the air. These are things we are not being told. They also if their pollution levels or averages are being effected will shut down a monitoring station that is doing lousy of whatever chemicals and thus make the average not as bad by using computer modeling from the areas around it that are not as bad of air pollution. Basically the government appointed agencies are fudging the results so they can say our pollution levels are better. Even still we are having more spare the air days which tells you the truth of the matter. I gave the CEC all that information back around Sept. 1999.

Thank You,

Hawkeyes - a Fellow MCS'er

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