car exhaust inhalation and cyclists

[latent aaaack]

I bicycle on a regular basis to work and consider it the most superior form of transportation yet available for 90% of uses. There's one problem though - while in a car I usually can barely ever notice car exhaust, when biking I often get a lung full of car exhaust when certain vehicles go by and in heavy traffic.

Does anyone know how much bike commuting in traffic and fumes on a daily basis could affect health over the long term?

Is there something that one could wear over the mouth to prevent inhaling car fumes like carbon monoxide and anything else contained in them? Would those surgical mask-like things you see Chinese people wearing in pictures of air-polluted Chinese cities work?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_monoxide_poisoning#Prevention

This article says most new cars don't emit much carbon monoxide but I don't know what else they emit that could be harmful if inhaled and many cars still do emit a lot of carbon monoxide.

Long term, repeated exposures present a greater risk to persons with coronary heart disease and in pregnant patients.[18] Chronic exposure may increase the incidence of cardiovascular symptoms in some workers, such as motor vehicle examiners, firefighters, and welders. Patients often complain of persistent headaches, lightheadedness, depression, confusion, and nausea. Upon removal from exposure, the symptoms usually resolve themselves.[19]

 

[shadron]

sulfur compounds, nitrate compounds, particulate carbon with impurities (inlcluding heavy metals), various other heavier compounds, ozone.

Additional compounds when UV sunlight reacts with all these.

 

[Tanja]

I cycle 11 miles (5.5 miles each way) every day through central London, and I often wonder the same.

Last year when I was having a medical checkup I asked the doctor this exact question. His opinion was that the benefits of cycling are much greater than the risks associated with car fumes. However, I know that this is just the opinion of one doctor.

I don't use a mask (or whatever you call it) but lots of people in London do. I actually wondered myself if they were any good, and whether they offer real protection.

ETA:

 

[Dogdoctor]

There are chemical respirators that filter out carbon monoxide. I am not sure if you can get one that would be comfortable to bike with. You might check on the internet or the phone book where you live or bike shop.


eta: I am sure they have something better than this
http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2007/10/19/masked-cyclist-sounds-gas-attack-warning/

 

[Wangler]

I don't use a mask (or whatever you call it) but lots of people in London do. I actually wondered myself if they were any good, and whether they offer real protection.

If you are referring to the "surgical" type of mask, they offer little to no protection.

Commonly referred to as "nuisance" dust masks, they don't really stop too much of the smaller aerosols, and they are useless for the gas and vapor phases, pretty much.

 

[Wangler]

Duplicate Post

 

[Gravy]

In case you're considering them (although they'd be awfully uncomfortable and would restrict breathing), half face air purifying respirator cartridges generally do not filter CO. In fact, I'm not aware of any that are recommended for that purpose. The problem is that there's no way to know when the filter is saturated with CO (not that that would be likely to happen in a traffic situation, but there you have it). That's why self-contained breathing devices, such as those used by firefighters, are recommended for high CO areas.

Of course, how much you're ingesting depends on the type of traffic you're in and for how long. Perhaps your local health department or environmental protection agency has done studies of air pollution near where you ride. If you're riding in heavy big-city traffic you likely are ingesting a substantial amount of CO. If you get headaches or shortness of breath or heart strain when in traffic, that's a very bad sign and you should stop. I've never had that problem in New York, but I have had irritation of the respiratory passages at times, which I assume is due to particulate matter and ozone. I don't know what the health effects of longer term but lesser exposure to CO are.

If a particularly bad pollution belcher passes me, I just hold my breath until I'm through the worst of it.

 

[bruto]

I would think that any respirator good enough to filter out gaseous fumes effectively would be difficult to breathe through when cycling, but I live in hilly country, so perhaps it's different on the level. Some of the hills around here require every molecule of air available, and then some. But it might be possible to filter out some of the diesel particulates with a good dust mask.

 

[quarky]

CO2 can also be a bummer, if you inhale too much.

 

[zooterkin]

Sorry, no reference, but I recall reading a while ago that most of the pollutants tended to collect in the lanes where the cars are - the movement of the cars tended to keep the gases together. Also, the highest concentration was near the ground; so, as a cyclist, you are avoiding most of the polluting gases (though perhaps not particulates), and in fact car drivers were exposed to higher levels of (from memory) carbon monoxide due to where the air intakes for the cars' air supply are.

ETA: This might be what I was thinking of. But I'd suggest a quick google session, as I think there are studies out there.

The ventilation of the volunteers was measured while they were using a car or a bicycle. The route and the type of transport influenced (P < 0.001) the concentrations of CO, benzene, toluene and xylenes. The daily average temperature was positively associated with the exposure of car drivers and cyclists to most compounds measured. A volunteer exhaled on average 2.3 times more air as a cyclist than as a car driver. Despite the much higher concentrations in the personal air samples of car drivers, the uptake of CO, benzene, toluene and xylenes of cyclists sometimes approached that of the car drivers.

 

[Dogdoctor]

Looking around there are some simple chemical filters made for cyclists. While these might not be the most effective methods of removing CO they are probably better than what you are doing now (nothing).

 

[fuelair]

If you are referring to the "surgical" type of mask, they offer little to no protection.

Commonly referred to as "nuisance" dust masks, they don't really stop too much of the smaller aerosols, and they are useless for the gas and vapor phases, pretty much.

And - a minor naming annoyance for me for a long time - so are most "gas masks". They are not good for real gasses, just for aerosols/dispursed particulates.