Smoke Emissions, Are They All Created Equal?
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While prescribed fires are widely used to prevent dangerous wildfires their health effects are not fully understood. Burn pits were also commonly used to dispose of military waste in overseas combat operations. Their adverse health outcomes however are not as well studied. This presentation will focus on how smoke emissions vary between the different types of fires (e.g., burn pit, wildfire, and prescribed fire) and the toxicity outcomes (e.g., lung toxicity and mutagenicity) of exposure to the smoke emissions. This will also provide comparison to toxic effects of ambient air pollution originated in a variety of human activities (e.g., gun firing smoke, diesel exhaust, and coal/residual fly ash). This presentation will help to better understand health effects of smoke exposures from burning biomass and synthetic materials and provide guidance to minimize health risks during wildfire smoke events.