Indonesia reports more than 170,000 haze-related respiratory cases

More than 170,000 respiratory cases have been recorded in Indonesian regions affected by wildfire haze, a health ministry official said on Tuesday, according to the South China Morning Post. Indonesia is continuing efforts to control fires in Borneo, Sumatra and Papua. The fires have covered parts of the archipelago with haze, while the smoke has also reached neighbouring Malaysia and Singapore.

The affected area includes parts of a country with a population of more than 280 million people. Air quality indices have fallen sharply in locations affected by the toxic smog, according to the supplied material. The haze contains pollutants including PM2.5, a fine particulate matter associated in the report with the respiratory-health concerns being recorded.

The material does not provide a breakdown of cases by province, age group or illness, and does not say how many people required hospital treatment. It also gives no figures for the number of fires, their causes or the area burned. The health ministry official’s statement establishes the scale of reported respiratory cases but does not provide a forecast for how the total may change.

Indonesia’s continuing challenge is to control the fires while communities in affected regions face deteriorating air quality. The supplied report does not describe specific firefighting measures or any additional health guidance issued by authorities.