Oberman said she worries the situation can get worse next summer. The culprit, she added, is climate change; an issue she wants to see acted on by province’s political parties.
“It’s really hard for event planners like us to figure out the right balance. We want to keep people safe. We want to also give people opportunities to get outside and enjoy summer,” said Oberman. “We plan ahead, we do our best, and then we have to make decisions day by day as to whether it’s safe to continue to do activities outside.”Along with outdoor safety, indoor air quality is also a concern in such weather conditions.
Tara Smith, general manager at Mr. Furnace, says a furnace works by taking in the air around it and pushing it back out after heating it up. A filter within the furnace ends up picking up all sorts of allergens, dust mites, dust, and even smoke particles. The higher the MERV rating – which determines the level of restriction or efficiency of a filter, the more restrictive the filter is and the more particles are caught. According to Smith, a rating between eight and 11 is standard. And a good filter, she added, can mean good indoor air quality.
“If you have higher MERV numbers, they collect more of that smoke. If you live in a home where you have someone who maybe has compromised breathing ability, whether that be asthma or there’s a myriad of things that it could be, then you should be looking at a better filtration system than just the filter on your furnace anyways,” said Smith.