BC Doctor Diagnoses Climate Change
Episode Stats
Words per Minute
155.6207
Summary
Nearly 1,000 people died in British Columbia last summer because of the extreme heat and smoke from the fires. Experts say climate change is to blame, and the government should do more to prepare for it. Ted Chenech talks to a doctor in the Kootenays and an expert on air pollution about the problem.
Transcript
00:00:00.000
This isn't the Kootenays a family doctor remembers as a boy.
00:00:06.800
I grew up in this area and I don't remember problems with heat or wildfire smoke growing up at all.
00:00:13.100
Since I've been back for the past eight years in the Kootenays,
00:00:16.680
more often than not during the summer we're having a significant period of wildfire smoke
00:00:23.880
He and many of his colleagues in Nelson and elsewhere in the province
00:00:27.100
have taken to adding the words climate change when filling out medical reports.
00:00:31.840
No one can say for sure, but logic dictates that some of the patients they're seeing
00:00:35.820
shouldn't have symptoms so severe if it wasn't for heat and smoke,
00:00:40.460
and especially if it doesn't cool off at night, which it didn't this past summer.
00:00:44.320
You know, you get dehydrated. That makes it harder to manage your blood sugars.
00:00:47.380
Then your diabetes can go into whack, which makes it even harder and even more likely to get dehydrated,
00:00:51.740
and then you show up in an emergency department.
00:00:53.100
This map from Health Canada shows the premature deaths per 100,000 for those exposed to certain air pollutants.
00:01:00.480
Worst in the country is B.C. Southern Interior,
00:01:03.120
and five of the top 15 regions in Canada are in B.C.,
00:01:06.700
with the Okanagan Simokamine easily topping that list.
00:01:10.360
An expert on air pollution believes our health care system needs to be better prepared for not if, but when.
00:01:16.420
It's pretty well understood that this is something we should anticipate,
00:01:20.780
and it's almost like we'll be lucky if next summer we don't have something like this.
00:01:26.160
He runs UBC's air pollution exposure lab, aimed at collecting the science needed to know what air pollutants,
00:01:31.940
be it diesel fumes or smoke particulates, are doing to the human body.
00:01:36.220
In some cases, reducing pollution levels can solve a lot of problems,
00:01:39.680
but that's never going to happen with wildfires.
00:01:41.940
People that can't afford air conditioners, et cetera, that don't have them,
00:01:46.120
they really should be supported by the government,
00:01:47.720
because otherwise we're just letting everyone down.
00:01:51.960
We're talking about deaths, nearly 1,000 last summer from heat alone.
00:01:55.700
So for the beleaguered taxpayer, subsidizing an air purifier or an air conditioner
00:02:00.280
for those who can't afford it might be far cheaper than even a short stay in a hospital.