When wildfires create smoky conditions it’s important for everyone to reduce their exposure to smoke pdf icon external icon. Wildfire smoke irritates your eyes, nose, throat, and lungs. It can make it hard to breathe and make you cough or wheeze. Children pdf icon external icon, pregnant women, and people with asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), or heart pdf icon disease, need to be especially careful about breathing wildfire smoke.
The root cause of global warming is human behavior, and a major part of the solution is to reduce fossil fuel use, which pumps planet-warming gases into the atmosphere. But meantime there are steps that can lessen the wildfire damage even as countries work to cut emissions.
