In an effort to reduce the growing health risks from wildfire smoke to some of the Bay Area’s most vulnerable residents, air regulators announced Thursday they plan to provide free air purifiers to 3,000 low-income Bay Area residents who suffer from asthma and other breathing problems.

The Bay Area Air Quality Management District, a state agency based in San Francisco, said it will spend $350,000 on the program, and will seek donations from corporations and others to expand it more broadly in the months ahead.

“The best health strategy is to prepare for these wildfire smoke events before they happen,” said Jack Broadbent, executive officer of the air district, at an event in San Jose to announce details.

Most at risk, experts say, are elderly, low-income people with pre-existing breathing problems who are stuck at home in residential hotels or apartments with little relief when air quality plummets due to wildfire smoke.

Air purifiers are devices that filter air in homes and other indoor locations to reduce pollution. Typically costing $100 to $200, they have been in increasing demand in recent years as California has suffered record fire seasons, which have sent soot and smoke levels soaring to dangerously unhealthy levels at times.

Under the air district’s new program, to qualify for a free air purifier, people must be on Medi-Cal, the state’s Medicaid health insurance program, and have a diagnosis of severe asthma or other respiratory problem from their doctor.

Bay Area residents who qualify and are interested in receiving a free air purifier should send an email to AirFilters@baaqmd.gov or call the following numbers based on their counties of residence:

Alameda County – 510-383-5178 (English) or 510-383-5185 (Spanish)
Contra Costa County – 925-839-0193
San Mateo, San Francisco, Santa Clara Counties – 503-884-7896

Decades of medical research have shown that soot is among the most dangerous types of air pollution. Generated by diesel trucks, power plants, fireplaces and other sources, the tiny particles can travel deep into the lungs, even entering the bloodstream, when people breathe them in high concentrations.

In mild levels they cause itchy eyes and sore throats, coughing and a tight feeling in the chest. In more severe instances, they can trigger asthma attacks, heart attacks, strokes or respiratory failure, particularly in the elderly, infants and people with heart and lung problems.

Last year smoke levels broke all-time records in California. On Sept. 9, smoke turned the air across Northern California an apocalyptic orange. The smoke from recent wildfires is estimated to have killed more people than the flames themselves.

“Wildfire smoke is something we all should take very seriously,” said Dr. Mary Prunicki, director of air pollution and health research at Stanford University’s Sean Parker Center for Allergy and Asthma Research. “Studies have shown the particulate matter coming from wildfire smoke is 10 times more toxic as the particulate matter in general air pollution from cars and industry.”

Some communities in the Bay Area, including East San Jose, West Oakland, Richmond, Bayview-Hunters Point and others have been exposed to higher levels of air pollution than other places because they are near freeways, ports and industrial sites. Many of those communities have higher levels of asthma among children than other areas.

“We get a double whammy in West Oakland,” said Margaret Gordon, co-founder of the West Oakland Environmental Indicators Project, a non-profit group. “We already have particulate matter from diesel, and simultaneously we are getting smoke from wildfires.”

Between last Aug. 1 and Sept. 10, historically bad concentrations of wildfire smoke were responsible for at least 1,200 and possibly up to 3,000 deaths in California that otherwise would not have occurred, according to an estimate by researchers at Stanford University. Those fatalities were among people 65 and older, most of whom were living with pre-existing medical conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and respiratory ailments.

The same Stanford researchers this week published a new study that concluded wildfire smoke increases the risk of pre-term births — with roughly 7,000 extra preterm births in California attributable to wildfire smoke exposure between 2007 and 2012, possibly from the smoke triggering an inflammatory reaction in the body.

Some community leaders said the air purifier program is overdue.

“We should have been doing this a long time ago,” said Poncho Guevara, executive director of Sacred Heart Community Service, a non-profit group based in San Jose that helps low-income people with food, clothing, and housing assistance. “But it takes moments like the wildfires to broaden the public’s consciousness that we have to do something. There are families and communities that are really vulnerable.”