Smog Stress Causing Psychological Problems : Feeling Blue? Could Be Air You’re Breathing

Southern Californians sizzling in triple-digit heat and choking on brown, soot-filled air may be suffering from an ailment unique to one of the nation’s most polluted areas--smog stress.

“People can’t see the mountains, they can’t see Catalina. They can’t see across the street,” said Jim Birakos, deputy executive director for the South Coast Air Quality Management District.

“There are definite psychological problems,” Birakos said. “There’s no doubt we’re having (smog) episodes. It looks like a typical year in that respect. The heat and humidity has made it seem much worse.”

The Los Angeles Basin is in the midst of smog season, which generally stretches from mid-April and mid-October. It’s at its worst in July, August and September.

Birakos said a people emotionally affected by smog show “stress, they’re irritable, or they might appear to be depressed.”

Newcomers to Southern California are often susceptible, he said. So are people living in an approximately 100-mile stretch from the San Fernando Valley to Fontana and beyond, where the smog is consistently the worst.

To cope, such people should “find a comfort zone,” preferably somewhere indoors that is cool and doesn’t have a view, Birakos said.

Don’t smoke. Stop use of aerosols. Avoid dust and fumes, traffic and contact with people suffering respiratory illnesses, Birakos said.

And take heart. Despite consistently brown skies, district officials say pollution in the traffic-congested basin is steadily improving. They point out that today the district meets most federal requirements for pollutants.

Unfortunately, it still suffers from high levels of ozone--created when particulates such as those emitted by the basin’s seven million automobiles mix with sunlight and produce smog.

And the basin itself conspires against efforts to clean up the skies as well. Sea breezes are generally too weak to push pollutants over the mountain ranges that rim three sides of the basin.

That, coupled with a heat inversion layer that acts like a lid on smog, leaves the gunk lingering in the air.

Thus, the basin has had 40 first-stage smog alerts so far this year--more than in many areas of the country but average for the basin over the last decade.

Only two second-stage smog alerts had been called. That represents a decline over the last 10 years, Birakos said. The duration of smog alerts is also shorter now than in the past, he said.

Officials ask residents to cutback on driving and physical activities during first-stage smog alerts, and request industry to cut back production if a second-stage alert is called. Third-stage alerts require industry to cut production.

The basin suffered 94 first-stage smog alerts last year, Birakos said, which is why it’s sometimes hard to convince the public smog is lessening.

“We still have problems,” he said. “But things are getting better.”