System created to update public on air quality

The spate of fires across the island in recent weeks has led the Caribbean Institute for Meteorology and Hydrology (CIMH) to develop a system to update the public on air quality.
CIMH climatologist Dr Cedric Van Meerbeeck says the online monitoring system has been created in collaboration with various agencies.
“Air pollution, as you know, comes from different sources. The ones we have been suffering from in the last two months were smoke from wildfires, brush fires, cane fires and grass fires. I just want you to know that the CIMH is on top of it. We have noticed it. We have worked together with different agencies and we now have a monitoring product that we will put online for everybody to use, so that you know how bad the situation is at this time because there are things you can do to protect yourself,” he said.
Dr Van Meerbeeck was responding to a question posed by a member of the audience at a panel discussion hosted by the CIMH in collaboration with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and The University of the West Indies Cave Hill Campus, on Tuesday night, at the Sagicor Cave Hill School of Business and Management.
Senior scientist in the NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory Dr. Roger Pulwarty highlighted that individuals’ health can be compromised by the combination of various pollutants in the atmosphere.
“When you add Saharan dust, when you add smoke and you add this especially indoor combination, you’re actually compounding health risks that cannot be separated immediately and that’s something we need to address,” he said.
“The complexity of the mixed pollutants [is] really the issue.”
(JB)