Wildfire smoke is everywhere — including our lungs

WNYC News

People in the New York City metro area have been dealing with wildfire smoke in the air over the last days and weeks, with fires burning everywhere from Brooklyn, to the Bronx, to New Jersey.

But our bodies don't just smell smoke in the air, we also feel it in our lungs. Wildfires contaminate the air with pollutants and drive up the air quality index, which is a measure of how safe to breathe it is outside.

Doctor Barbara Mann is a pulmonologist at the Mount Sinai National Jewish Health Respiratory Institute and an associate professor of medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. She joined WNYC's David Furst to talk about the impacts of wildfire smoke on pulmonary health.