{"id":18,"date":"2020-07-22T17:17:03","date_gmt":"2020-07-22T17:17:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/2020\/07\/22\/opinion-we-must-look-beyond-diesel-our-lives-depend-on-it"},"modified":"2020-07-22T17:17:03","modified_gmt":"2020-07-22T17:17:03","slug":"opinion-we-must-look-beyond-diesel-our-lives-depend-on-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/news\/commentary\/opinion-we-must-look-beyond-diesel-our-lives-depend-on-it","title":{"rendered":"OPINION: We must look beyond diesel; our lives depend on it"},"content":{"rendered":"

People Post is a space for opinion pieces, letters to the editor and guest submissions from members of the Long Beach community. The following is an op-ed submitted by Dan Witzling, Executive Director of the American Cancer Society of Los Angeles-Central Coast and Healthy Air Alliance Advisory Board Member,<\/em><\/i>\u00a0and does not necessarily reflect the views of the Long Beach Post.<\/i><\/p>\n

We are living in unprecedented times. The heaviness is pendulous. The daily images are discomforting. Perhaps most worrisome is that the facts to support the emotions are real and sobering.<\/p>\n

Representing American Cancer Society in the Los Angeles Central Coast, we are relentlessly working to save lives by helping more people engage in wellness behavior while supporting research to find cures. A challenging task is to translate scientific data to reach diverse audiences, particularly vulnerable populations since we recognize that ZIP code is a higher cancer risk factor than genetic code. For instance, the most prominent rates of lung cancer in the Los Angeles area exist along transportation hubs such as Long Beach, Carson, Wilmington and Torrance. Even during the economic downturn caused by COVID-19, 40% of goods around the country we all order, and increasingly to our homes, travel first through these and other Los Angeles communities.<\/p>\n

Diesel-fueled trucks are responsible for almost\u00a0one-third of California\u2019s annual emissions<\/a> of nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions. They also emit more particulate matter pollution than all of California\u2019s power plants combined.\u00a0According to the\u00a0World Health Organization<\/a>,\u00a0air pollution tops the list of global health threats. That is because nine out of 10 people breathe unhealthy air, resulting in a death toll of seven million people each year.\u00a0According to the EPA<\/a>, people exposed to toxic air pollutants\u00a0suffer from higher mortality rates, hospitalizations and disease, such as cancer.<\/p>\n

Perhaps the cruelest data point in all of this is that these deaths are preventable, not by medical discoveries or laboratory research or even a hard-fought cure, but rather by people like you taking note of the issue and then taking action.<\/p>\n

We have the most tangible evidence of what a change in behavior can do for our air quality right now, right here in our own backyards. The recent clear-sky views and rarely seen vistas that Californians were\u00a0sharing<\/a>\u00a0in the last few months are copious and breathtaking. To achieve this, we simply drove a lot less. Likewise, if we want to curb the deadly emissions from diesel particulate matter (DPM), a leading cause of air pollution in California, we must reduce our exposure and\u00a0look beyond the use of diesel<\/a>.<\/p>\n

When the American Cancer Society was founded in 1913, it was not considered appropriate to mention the word \u201ccancer\u201d in public. Any information regarding cancer was obscured in a climate of shame and even denial. In many ways, we are in a similar climate in 2020 around so many issues,\u00a0including the deadly\u00a0racial disparities of COVID-19<\/a>\u00a0and unequal\u00a0environmental exposure<\/a>\u00a0that make\u00a0African American<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Latinx<\/a>\u00a0communities more susceptible to health threats.<\/p>\n

Unlike the cloak of quiet around cancer at the turn of the century, I am heartened and inspired today by a surge in collective action on display in social media and growing dialog on what we can accomplish together. My hope is that we don\u2019t stop any of this, that we keep persevering. My hope is that dark times have brought about a flicker of inspiration that continues to burn bright, that we as a state, and even as a nation, will take this evidence before us and, rather than shy away because the task is seemingly insurmountable or too complicated, we instead lean into the knowledge, embrace the science, and know that our action in a democracy can bring about important, life-saving change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Diesel-fueled trucks are responsible for almost\u00a0one-third of California\u2019s annual emissions of nitrogen oxide (NOx) emissions. They also emit more particulate matter pollution than all of California\u2019s power plants combined.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":34,"featured_media":1039,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"newspack_sponsor_sponsorship_scope":"","newspack_sponsor_native_byline_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_native_category_display":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_style":"inherit","newspack_sponsor_underwriter_placement":"inherit","inline_featured_image":false,"newspack_ads_suppress_ads":false,"newspack_popups_has_disabled_popups":"","_":"","_author_alias":"","cap-aim":"","cap-description":"","cap-display_name":"","cap-first_name":"","cap-jabber":"","cap-last_name":"","cap-linked_account":"","cap-newspack_employer":"","cap-newspack_job_title":"","cap-newspack_phone_number":"","cap-newspack_role":"","cap-user_email":"","cap-user_login":"","cap-website":"","cap-yahooim":"","newspack_article_summary":"","newspack_email_html":"","newspack_email_type":"","newspack_featured_image_position":"","newspack_hide_page_title":"","newspack_hide_updated_date":false,"newspack_post_subtitle":"","newspack_show_share_buttons":"","newspack_sponsor_byline_prefix":"","newspack_sponsor_disclaimer_override":"","newspack_sponsor_flag_override":"","newspack_sponsor_only_direct":"","newspack_sponsor_url":"","newspack_article_summary_title":"Overview:","newspack_show_updated_date":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[32,27],"newspack_spnsrs_tax":[],"coauthors":[28],"class_list":["post-18","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","tag-dan-witzling","tag-people-post","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/34"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18"},{"taxonomy":"newspack_spnsrs_tax","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/newspack_spnsrs_tax?post=18"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/voices\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=18"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}