Can Prescribed Fires Mitigate Health Harm? - A Review of Air Quality and Public Health

This report is organized into the following sections: • 1.0 Introduction and Approach: Overview of wildfire risk in the United States and the need to evaluate and weigh the air quality and human health risks associated with prescribed fire smoke and wildfire smoke. [...] • 4.0 Prescribed Fire Smoke: A review of the air quality and human health impacts of prescribed fire smoke and a summary of prescribed fire management practices aimed to reduce harmful smoke exposure. [...] • 5.0 Comparison of Air Quality and Health Impacts of Wildfire and Prescribed Fire Smoke: A comparative discussion of the air quality and human health impacts of wildfire and prescribe fire smoke, including a summary of exposure reduction measures and research gaps. [...] Page 23 | Prescribed Fire Smoke Below we discuss similarities and differences of wildfire and prescribed fire in the United States in the context of air quality, smoke exposure, and human health. [...] In this section, we discuss (1) the number and magnitude of wildfires and prescribed fires in recent years in the United States; (2) smoke composition, magnitude of smoke emissions, and duration of exposure; (3) health risks and impacts documented in the literature; (4) vulnerability and equity dimensions; and (5) smoke exposure reduction measures.