People who cannot avoid going abroad will have to wear a mask, preferably an N95.
Photo: KAMIL KRZACZYNSKI/AFP/Getty Images
Smoke from the wildfires in Canada has once again made its presence felt on US soil, this time in the Midwest, where air quality alerts have been issued across the region.
Cloudy, smoky skies were reported Tuesday over cities in Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Iowa and Ohio, but Chicago had the worst air quality in the world. on Tuesday, according to IQAir.com, a Swiss organization that measures the amount of pollutants in the air.
Residents began to notice a change in the air from 4 pm yesterday, when a red or unhealthy category alert was issued.
By 10 p.m., the Chicago area had an air quality index of 156, the second worst in the world, behind only Lahore, Pakistan, which registered 175, so this smoke presence could be “significantly thicker than what was dealt with earlier this month” in the Big Apple, CBS News reported.
The city’s air quality index is in the “very unhealthy” category for all age groups, reminiscent of the hazy, unhealthy skies of New York City a few weeks ago.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson said that the city is “carefully monitoring and taking precautions.”
“We recommend that children, adolescents, older adults, people with heart or lung disease, and pregnant people avoid strenuous activities and limit their time outdoors,” Johnson said.
The Illinois Environmental Protection Agency issued an Air Quality Alert in effect until midnight Wednesday and encouraged Chicagoans to limit their time outdoors.
Earlier this month, emissions from approximately 400 wildfires in Canada cast an orange haze over major metropolitan areas, including New York City, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, DC.
Meanwhile, the AirNow website, a platform that tells Americans what the condition is in each state, explained that in Chicago there is a negative score of more than 180, which is why the alert is red, which it considers to the air as unhealthy.
Keep reading:
• The disturbing images of the orange sky of New York due to the cloud of smoke coming from Canada
• Videos showed the “doomsday scenario” caused by the smoke that invades the northeast of the US.
• The map showing the smoke cloud that covers North America and generates a health alert for tens of millions of people.
