Maui yangınlarından sonra metal maruziyeti devam etti

A University of Hawaiʻi study examined 1,400 Maui adults between six and eighteen months after the 2023 wildfires to investigate longer-term environmental health effects. Researchers measured 24 metals in urine and assessed lung function during the same visits. Compared with United States reference data, participants showed much higher concentrations of several metals, including antimony at nearly forty times the reference level. Across three statistical approaches, greater combined metal exposure was associated with multiple signs of abnormal lung function. However, the team cautions that the results do not identify a single source. Hawaiʻi’s geology, diet, former agricultural and industrial activity, wildfire debris and the remobilisation of older pollutants may all have contributed. Because no comparable measurements were collected before the fires, the study cannot determine how much exposure was caused directly by the disaster. The researchers therefore call for long-term biomonitoring and environmental sampling that extends beyond short-term checks of smoke and airborne particles.