preview

Essay on The Indoor Air Quality of Natatoriums

Best Essays

The indoor air quality of natatoriums has become a significant health hazard, particularly regarding competitive swimmers. The lack of regulations and legislature has made this situation worse. HVAC systems, Heating Ventilating & Air Conditioning, are designed to control the air temperature. They have many different uses, for example, regulating the humidity and fresh air turnover rate. However, they do not “clean the air”. As said in the USA Swimming article The Air Quality Issue, “…air quality is directly affected by the water quality, i.e. bad water = bad air!” This “bad air” they speak of stems from the chloramines within the water. Chloramines are chlorine compound that unlike the traditional chlorine, they cannot burn off in the …show more content…

Some of the physical symptoms attributed to disinfection byproducts include coughing, eye and nose irritation, anemia, stomach discomfort, damaged hair and skin. Severe symptoms include wheezing or aggravating asthma. It has also been found that the routine breathing of irritants may increased sensitivity to other types of irritants such as fungi and bacteria. Improperly balanced chlorinated pools can actually cause severe asthma. These findings may explain why swimmers are more prone to exercise induced asthma than athletes in other sports. "Results show that nitrogen trichloride or trichloramine is a cause of occupational asthma in swimming pool workers like lifeguards and swim instructors," says Dr. K. Thickett of the Occupational Lung Diseases Unit at the Birmingham Heartlands Hospital. In Dr. Thickett's study, his subjects either stopped taking inhaled corticosteroids altogether, or their asthma symptoms decreased significantly once they were placed in an environment away from the swimming pools. Dr. Thickett's study has been supported by research from other European and Australian sources. Outdoor aquatic facilities have plenty of fresh air and UV light, which means they are not as susceptible to the chloramine problem. Chloramine formation can be accelerated by a wide variety of aquatic activities.

Get Access