Effects of Haze

Recently, there was a haze situation which was caused by the slash and burn of forest in Sumatra, Indonesia. The smoke from the forest fire has choked the neighboring country, Singapore and Malaysia. It had caused a huge impact on Singapore.

Extra lessons, remedial, co-curricular activities and outdoor activities organized by the school during the June holidays were cancelled due to the haze. Haze was measured using the Pollutant Standards Index, PSI. The PSI reading went up to the hazardous range and all school activities was cancelled. As the extra lessons are cancelled, when school reopens, the teachers will have to rush the syllabus. As a result, we students will have to stay back in school after curriculum time for extra lessons. This will also lead to us being more tiring and stressful than before.

The health effects of the haze are mainly caused by the irritant effects of fine dust particles on the nose, throat, skin and eyes. People with medical problems such as asthma, chronic lung disease and allergic skin conditions are more likely to be affected. The haze also causes health problems such as eye inflammation, nasal irritation that stimulates mucus production and throat irritation leads to mucus discharge which can clog the respiratory tract. In addition, it may cause lung tissue inflammation and scarring. Patients with lung, heart and severe asthmatic problems may have difficulty breathing. 

The haze also causes tourism in Singapore to drop. For instance, the Singapore flyer and Seletar airport which services charted flights were closed as precautionary safety measures. Many other tourist attractions such as DUCKtours suspended the operations. These caused economic damage in Singapore.

The effects of the haze are not only what I had mentioned above. It had caused us inconvenience and affected our lives. We should learn to take precautions if such incident would happen again.