{"id":8939,"date":"2018-08-10T16:53:14","date_gmt":"2018-08-10T16:53:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=8939"},"modified":"2018-08-10T16:53:14","modified_gmt":"2018-08-10T16:53:14","slug":"health-impacts-of-oil-and-gas-pollution-texas-mom-shares-her-story","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/?p=8939","title":{"rendered":"Health Impacts of Oil and Gas Pollution: Texas Mom Shares Her Story"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Misti O\u2019Quinn of Dallas County says her children\u2019s asthma is exacerbated by nearby oil and gas infrastructure. Photo: Moms Clean Air Force<\/p><\/div>\n

by Mary Kuhlman<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Dallas \u2013<\/strong>\u00a0The Environmental Protection Agency and Interior Department are rolling back regulations for pollution from oil and gas facilities, and a new report says that\u2019s putting children at risk.<\/p>\n

The\u00a0report<\/a>, from Moms Clean Air Force, lays out what it claims are the consequences of pollution from oil and gas drilling, in the words of seven women living in vulnerable communities.<\/p>\n

Dallas County mom Misti O\u2019Quinn is among those sharing her story. She said nearby oil and gas infrastructure poses a serious threat to her three children \u2013 two of whom suffer from moderate to severe asthma. Smog makes it worse, she said, and air pollution knows no borders.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo it all just kind of blows in,\u201d O\u2019Quinn said. \u201cThat mixed with car exhaust, mixed with buses \u2013 it\u2019s just almost like a melting pot of bad stuff for your lungs.\u201d<\/p>\n

O\u2019Quinn said her daughter missed an entire week of classes during the last school year because of asthma flare-ups. According to the report, oil and gas pollution is responsible for more than 140,000 summertime asthma attacks in Texas children, and more than 105,000 lost school days.<\/p>\n

The Dallas-Fort Worth area also is rated worst nationally for the health burden on African-Americans from oil and gas pollution. Quinn said this vulnerability inspired her to create the group Breath is Lyfe, which educates parents about the impacts of air pollution on health.<\/p>\n

\u201cNone of us are exempt from it. In the nicer areas where they don\u2019t see it, it\u2019s just not an issue to them, but it really is,\u201d she said. \u201cSo we to all need to come together on that, and I feel like we can be pretty successful in making our voices heard.\u201d<\/p>\n

O\u2019Quinn noted the Dallas area has been in a state of non-attainment for quite some time, which means air pollution is above levels considered healthy to breathe. And she\u2019s outraged that federal officials want to weaken safeguards that help protect communities.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust from the standpoint of being in attainment based on the standards that were already in place, we haven\u2019t even done that, and we know that the air is bad,\u201d she said. \u201cSo for us to roll back any of the safeguards that are supposed to be there, how would that not make it worse? It\u2019s baffling.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to the report, more than 8 million tons of methane smog forming volatile organic compounds are released into the air every year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Mary Kuhlman Dallas \u2013\u00a0The Environmental Protection Agency and Interior Department are rolling back regulations for pollution from oil and gas facilities, and a new report says that\u2019s putting children at risk. The\u00a0report, from Moms Clean Air Force, lays out what it claims are the consequences of pollution from oil and gas drilling, in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":8936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8939"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8940,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8939\/revisions\/8940"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/losfresnosnews.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}