The heat wave that hits the southern United States has lasted for two weeks, with thermal sensations above 40ºC. At least 13 people have died in recent days due to high temperatures.
In the city of Houston, in the southern state of TexasFour refineries operate, one of them among the largest in the country.
“In previous years a heat emergency would normally last two, three, maybe four days tops. What’s different about this year is that since June 14 we’ve had excessive heat, which means the heat index is 108 F (42ºC) or higher. And I have never seen in the last 20 years that it extends beyond a week,” Houston Health Department spokesman Porfirio Villarreal told AFP.
According to the official, between 4 and 10 people die annually in this city of 2.3 million inhabitants, due to a disease associated with excessive heat.
Erandi Treviño, 31, is director of the Healthy Port Communities Coalition (HPCC), which brings together environmental and health protection entities in Houston. She lives next door to a freight truck parking lot, whose exhaust emissions enter her home and garden. She also participates in EcoMadres and Moms Clean Air Force, of mothers who watch over the environment in their communities.
Less than 10 km away is the navigable channel of the port of Houston, where an important industrial and petrochemical activity in the country is concentrated. The combination of heat and pollution breaks your health.
“It’s a burning sensation in the eyes when you cough,” says Treviño, also an organizer with Public Citizen, from her home in southeast Houston. Meanwhile, on the other side of her fence, the ignition of truck engines is heard.
Her mother and her nieces have similar physical reactions to ozone to hers. As therapy and in support of her activism, she set up a nursery in her garden.
The “bad” ozone
There is “good ozone” or ozone layer, at the stratospheric level, of natural formation and that protects living beings from ultraviolet rays. But, as the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) explains, tropospheric ozone, or at ground level, is generated by chemical reactions.
“This happens when pollutants emitted by automobiles, power plants, industrial boilers, refineries, chemical plants, and other sources react chemically in the presence of sunlight,” the federal entity explains on its website. It is a component of smog.
He explains that it often reaches harmful levels on hot, sunny days in urban settings and can be carried long distances by wind.
Erandi specifies that no level of tropospheric ozone is good for health, although the environmental authorities have established 70 parts per billion as the limit. According to measurements by the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, in early June there were entries of 99, but during this recent heat wave the highest level has been 46.
However, Erandi says that one of his demands is that meters be placed closer to the industries, because there are none.
According to the American Lung Association, which addresses lung health problems in the US, nearly 120 million Americans (out of a population of 330 million) who live in places with poor ratings for harmful levels of ozone or particle pollution are at risk of health in 2023.
“It’s extremely dangerous for our long-term health, especially for children and older people who already have health problems,” says Esmeralda Carr, a 32-year-old mother of four who is also a neighbor of Erandi and manager of a dental office.
the most vulnerable
“When you have those days, more people go to hospitals, they may have asthma, which is exacerbated by that ozone or that pollution. We monitor the air, that way we provide that data and then alerts can be issued,” Villarreal details. In those circumstances it is usually suggested to avoid outdoor activities.
Those who suffer the most damage are African-Americans and people of Latin American origin, who live in communities affected by pollution, says the Lung Association.
In 2022, the environmental group Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) asserted that Hispanic American communities are disproportionately affected by oil and gas pollution in many cities throughout California, New Mexico and Texas, and called on the EPA to adopt stricter regulations for the emitters of polluting gases, with regular inspections.
FUENTE: AFP
