MCS , Ambient PM, and COVID 19

[michael edward badolato jr]

Vehicle exhaust has not dramatically improved.

I understand it seems futile to admit the exhaust is major since it is very difficult to do anything about.

Catalytic converters reduce certain substances and create others. True hydrocarbons and CO greatly reduced and coarser PM - but what remains is an ultrafine mess with aerosol acid sulfate.

I have lived out remote as I can for decades - at locations I thought would be good enough but the pollution moves. 

It would be indelicate for me to be more specific as to the severity of vehicle exhaust.

There is nothing low level or commonly tolerated about it. And these are not unrelated chemicals.

You said yourself there is no safe level of PM 2.5. They reduced the emissions when you measure 2.5 - but UFPM is less than 1.0 - even less than 0.1 - the smaller sizes have a greater surface to mass ratio so can carry larger amounts of adsorbed chemical.The larger PM are apt to be noticed with airway symptoms - but UFPM is so honed down - it can feel smooth but go right to your head. Once on it - its just rum dumb.

That's how indelicate it is to talk about. All of this time - I have learned that with no combustion byproducts there is life - bring on any amount of exhaust it is pain and misery - and deterioration.

MCS is more fatal than COVID 19 - and in fact the ambient exhaust is more fatal than COVID 19. All you have to do is stop and think about it. It is about life expectancy - it has long been known that ambient exhaust costs at least 2 years life expectancy averaged over the entire population.

MCS systemic inflammation is a risk factor towards heart failure due to atherogenicity - and also approx 50% have cerebral hypoperfusion indicating brain neuroinflammation and increased activated microglia - that presents a condition at risk for autonomic sympthetic nerve from the hypothalamus driven cardiac dysregulation and arrhythmia - and a stroke like cardiac failure. MCS people likely have a life expectancy at least 5 years less than average for everyone else - the only reason it isn't more obvious is because of the very unhealthy diet and exercise habits so prevalent in reducing life expectancy.

Anyway - I better dummy up now.

A little math tells you: infect 200 million people with COVID 19 at .5% death rate = 1 million fatalities. That is total infections not confirmed cases. Comparing deaths to confirmed cases exaggerates the fatality rate. At 10 years loss of life expectancy per each of the 1 million fatalities equals 10 million total lost years. 

Now suppose you choose to have MCS instead of COVID - after all you said MCS isn't usually fatal - BIG SMILE HERE - you blew that one! so the 200 million who catch MCS can't get rid of it and each lose 5 years of life expectancy = 1 billion lost years compared to 10 million for COVID - that makes MCS 100 times more fatal than COVID!

However, there is somewhat of a catch - it has been reported that perhaps one third of those infected with COVID may have some long term effects - so we could adjust the comparison - and to be even more conservative - we could take half of the 200 million - 100 million times 5 years lost equals 500 million lost years thus making MCS only 2 times more fatal than COVID.