Comments about ‘Exercise in dirty air equal to smoking, doctor says’

Once again, Dr. Moench grossly overstates the risks of air pollution.

Once again, the Deseret News uncritically posts his opinions.

Heaven help us if Dr. Moench ever finds out how much pollution the average person breathes in while roasting marshmallows around a campfire. One can imagine the mandatory warning labels on Sta-Puft bags.

I am rolling my eyes at Rolling My eyes. When a expert says that going out in the air and exercising is bad and the gov't agrees, perhaps it's time to take a look at the cause. But then it's much easier to bury your head and pretend that there is no problem. Roasting marshmellows or hot dogs on a campfire is a temporary issue. This smog is all pervasive and lasts a lot longer than a campfire. Exercise causes the lungs to work harder and inhale even more contaminent. It takes time for your body to expel the foreign particles. In the meantime, you can exercise all you want outside.
I just hope you don't pay for it too badly with your health.

How can a lay person with no medical training make assumptions about a trained Physicians statements with regard to pollution. If people want to ignore his advice, then fine. But for me I am sensitive to the pollution and I'll choose to take the Doctors advise and stay out of it.

Uh, Dr. Moench is an anethesiologist, not a pollution expert, and no, the government does not agree with him.

For example, in the article Dr. Moench says that current levels of air pollution are "unhealthy for everybody"; according to the EPA the current air quality designation is "Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups" only.

Dr. Moench claims that breathing in air pollution is like smoking a pack of cigarettes; last year, the Utah Division of Air Quality's own toxicologist took the unusual step of publicly disagreeing with him.

Dr. Moench is an activist, one who has an agenda to push. While he might be technically correct sometimes, he quite often fails to "see the forest in the trees".

Thank You Dr. Moench, I am always looking for any excuse not to exercise, now I can add pollution.

I wouldn't rule out what Dr. Moench has to say just because he doesn't work for the Division of Air Quality. I knew someone who walked a few miles to work every day, some of it along a busy street. After he had a physical, his doctor asked him how much he smoked. He didn't.

Oh, doctors say many things. Sometimes they have no idea what they are talking about. A lot of know all guesses in all sincerity.

I knew air pollution was dangerous for the unborn, but I didn't realize it stayed in our bodies for a month!

I will take the doctor's advice and stay out of it as much as possible. I will avoid driving on the yellow- and red-alert days -- and cut down on driving every day for that matter.

I wish my neighbors would quit burning their fireplaces, which they usually do on green and yellow days, but by burning at all, they are helping to create the red days.

Go jog at the Olympic Oval on the 440 M track outside the ice. HEPA filtered air and always the same temp for optimum ice.

Being scared is what most environmental activists want you to be.

That way, you're more willing to give up your money/technology/freedom in order to "save" yourself or the planet.

As President Obama's Chief of Staff Rahm Emmanuel once said: "Never waste a good crisis".

I have been highly skeptical of some of Dr. Moench's statements in the past. I don't claim to be an expert in this area. I would be very interested in what a pulmonologist (lung specialist) has to say about Dr. Moench's claims. I could see that exercising in bad air could be dangerous, but not exercising is also dangerous and if you add up enough bad air days it is a rx for obesity and a host of medical problems. It is about balancing the benefits and the risks and I feel Dr. Moench does a very poor job of even opening up a discussion about benefits/risks.

A commentator above correctly noted that Dr. Moench has an agenda to pursue and doesn't speak for the medical community. Some of his past posts have been downright contradictory to sound science.

I hope he uses better science as an anesthesiologist than he does as an environmentalist.

Yes, the DAQ's toxicologist argued with Dr. Moench and you know what, the toxicologist lost. (I was at the meeting). The point Dr. Moench was making is that breathing in polluted air is similar to smoking cigs/or breathing second-hand smoke -- in essence your body cannot tell the difference. That in no way diminishes the risks associated with smoking, but rather highlights the serious consequences of fouling our air.

Thank you, Dr. Moench for taking a stand on an issue that is so serious and affects all of us along the Wasatch Front.

Anyone who cares about the quality of life in the community gets attacks by conservatives who put their greed over the good of people. You couldn't pass biology in high school, but you are smarter than a doctor about chemical toxicity and exposure. If you're and uneducated conservative you can say you were indoctrinated by the evils of education.

How did the DAQ's toxicologist "lose" the debate in your eyes? Is it because you agreed with Dr. Moench before you even walked into the room?

Of course particulate pollution can be bad for the respiratory system. But the error that Dr. Moench -- and most environmentalists -- continue to make is the fact that something is toxic does not necessarily mean it is a health hazard: It depends entirely on the dose.

So yes, while there are some common chemicals in cigarette smoke and particulate pollution, there is a huge difference in the dosage: Intentionally breathing in cigarette smoke throughout the day delivers orders of magnitude more of toxic chemicals to your lungs than even exercising in high particulate pollution.

Comparing the two is roughly akin to saying that because swallowing a whole bottle of aspirin can kill you, taking two aspirin will have the same effect. Not even close.

so is he saying we shouldn't work out at all because indoor air is as bad as outdoor air?

We shouldn't breath at all then until the air clears?

Conservatives' minds have become so deadened listening to their talk-radio gurus tell them "man is NOT polluting the earth" that they view dirty air as no big deal and just something liberals made up.
Such stupid, angry people!

Man is the only animal that poisons its own drinking water and the air that it breathes.
Only the most ego-centered (the kind that believes they are gods of their own planet) cannot recognize this fact.

I find it ironic that there are so many people that call conservatives and and stupid, and yet more often then not they are not the ones that are name calling and putting exclamations in their posts. I go to work everyday and her my boss criticize the "conservative talk-show hosts" and call them hate mongers and fear mongers, yet when I hear him talk about "man made global warming" it is thier opinion that seems like fear mongering to me. It is lame that we are being scared into submission. We can be responsible for ourselves we do not need the government to tell us what is best for us. That greater good argument is lame and is one of the main reasons we are losing our freedoms.

I'd like cleaner air, but I don't think I'll stop breathing everytime I go outside. I think that'd probably be unsafe too.