14 DAY TRIAL // Specialists from the SUNY Downstate Medical Center and Lutheran Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York recently investigated how traffic jams can affect the health of those stuck in them and of those living close to intensely circulated highways.
Their findings, published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology just two days ago, indicate that, as a result of gas exhaust fumes released by running engines, adults can develop respiratory disorders such as asthma.
To be more precise: spending considerable hours stuck in traffic and having your home close to interstates can lead to your experiencing symptoms such as lung swelling or narrowing, wheezing, shortness of breath, coughing and so on.
Interestingly enough, this research was not based solely on collecting some air samples and analyzing them in laboratories, with the end goal of predicting how the chemical compounds found in said air samples might impact of public health.
Quite the contrary: as Greener Ideal informs us, 45 adults suffering from breathing disorders were asked to report on their lifestyle.
When most of them admitted to spending a lot of time close to congested highways, the researchers knew that there must be some link between intense car traffic and asthma.
According to the SUNY Downtown Medical Center website, MD Maria-Anna Vastardi argued how, “Our participants were randomly recruited and we observed that the patients who reported asthma live significantly closer to the Gowanus Expressway, compared to the healthy controls who live in the same area, but at a longer distance from the Gowanus.”
As researchers explain, there are multiple solutions for this problem.
For example, people may choose to resort to public transportation rather than have each and every one of them drive different cars to the same destination.
As well as this, there is the possibility of opting for greener vehicles, whose negative impact on the environment is virtually inexistent.