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 ummer smog (ground-level ozone) sends an estimated
53,000 persons to the hospital, 159,000 to the emergency room
and triggers 6,200,000 asthma attacks each summer in the eastern
half of the United States, according to a study released today
by Clear the Air: National Campaign Against Dirty Power, a new
joint project of the Clean Air Task Force (CATF), National Environmental
Trust (NET), and US Public Interest Research Group (PIRG).
 "These
numbers show that ozone smog is a public health crisis affecting
hundreds of communities," said Conrad Schneider, Technical
and Policy Coordinator of CATF, one of the founders of Clear
the Air: National Campaign Against Dirty Power. "Despite
popular impression, this is not just a Northeast problem. From
Texas to Illinois and from Georgia to Maine, and everywhere in
between, people are admitted to the hospital for serious, prolonged
respiratory distress due to ozone smog."
Out
of Breath: Health Effects from Ozone in the Eastern US, authored by Abt Associates, the consulting firm
under contract with the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
to analyze air pollution damages, looked at the 37 Eastern states
affected by US EPA's summer smog rule, estimating a range of
health impacts for 34 cities within the region as well as for
each individual state.
Among
the report's findings for states and metropolitan areas are:
- Texas had 4,600 hospital admissions, 1,700
emergency room visits for asthma, and 660,000 asthma attacks.
- The state of New York had 4,100 hospital
admissions, 1,200 emergency room visits for asthma, and 510,000
ozone-caused asthma attacks.
- The Washington, DC metropolitan area had
800 hospital admissions, 340 emergency room visits, and 130,000
ozone-caused asthma attacks.
- The Atlanta metropolitan area had 800 hospital
admissions, 340 emergency room visits, and 130,000 ozone-caused
asthma attacks.
"An
accident or national disaster that sent this many people to emergency
rooms would be front-page news," said Rebecca Stanfield,
Clean Air Advocate for US PIRG "Although the effects of
ozone are spread out over the course of the summer, the suffering
of people with respiratory problems is no less real."
Ozone is a highly reactive gas that is the main component
of summer smog. Ozone is capable of destroying organic matter,
including human lung and airway tissue, by essentially burning
through cell walls. Coal-fired power plants are the single largest
industrial contributor to ozone pollution, emitting more than
one-quarter of the nation's ozone-forming nitrogen oxides.
Last year, US EPA directed 22 states to cut smog-forming
pollution from power plants by approximately 85 percent below
1990 levels. Several Midwestern states sued to block the reductions,
and a panel of the DC Circuit Court delayed implementation of
the EPA plan. Recently, the New York state attorney general's
office announced that it would sue 17 coal-burning power plants.
"The easiest, most cost-effective thing we can
do to reduce this misery is to cut smog-forming pollution from
old, dirty power plants. As the Out of Breath study shows,
our lungs are depending on it," said Phil Clapp of National
Environmental Trust. "The Clean Air Act needs to be strengthened
to protect the health of millions of Americans. Congressmen Henry
Waxman (D-CA) and Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) have introduced legislation
to accomplish that goal, and their bill should be a central part
of Congress' next reauthorization of the Act."
Last month, Congressmen Waxman and Boehlert introduced
The Clean Smokestacks Act of 1999, which would close an existing
legal loophole that allows old power plants to emit as much as
ten times more pollution than a new plant may emit, while setting
national caps for the four main power plant pollutants.
Senator James Inhofe (R-OK), chairman of the Senate
subcommittee with jurisdiction over the Clean Air Act has indicated
that he will soon begin hearings leading to an overhaul of the
Act by his panel in January, 2001. 
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