Summary
This study looks at how wildfire smoke affects people with asthma in California. It is known that wildfire smoke exposure can make asthma worse, but authors wanted to understand exactly how it impacts asthma control, the risk of asthma attacks, and the need for asthma-related healthcare. They created a computer simulation with 5,000 virtual Californians who have asthma and looked at what happened to them during and after a wildfire, compared to if there was no wildfire.
Findings: Without wildfire smoke, about half (48%) of the virtual group had good control over their asthma, and only a small percentage (8%) needed to go to the hospital for asthma-related reasons. During and after the wildfire, the percentage of people with good asthma control dropped to 27% as people were exposed to smoke, and more people needed to use health care services. This increase in asthma problems led to higher medical costs and reduced quality of life for the group exposed to wildfire smoke.
Age- and county-specific asthma prevalence data based on the 2019–2020 California Health Interview Survey (CHIS) were used in this study.
