Utah Public Radio: Health care professionals ask policymakers to save Great Salt Lake
UPHE’s Dr. Brian Moench spoke on Utah Public Radio about our sign-on letter for the medical community. The letter urges the Utah legislature to take meaningful action to get water back to Great Salt Lake, and avoid the looming public health threats from it receding.
“Dust particles should not be viewed as any more of a benign form of air pollution than any other type of air pollution. But then when you add in the increased toxicity of the heavy metals — the bottom line is, it’s a significant source of air pollution and a significant health hazard affecting, at minimum, at least 2 million people,” Moench said on UPR.
He explained how air pollution can lead to diseases in almost every critical organ system —, asthma, heart disease, strokes, cancers, even neurological diseases like Alzheimers.
“So much of the common thread between these various diseases involves inflammation of the blood vessels, you can think of air pollution as a blood vessel disease,” Moench said. “So we want people to understand that the list of adverse health outcomes is an extremely long list, everyone is likely to be affected, and we really need to do something about it.”