Swimming Causes Asthma - Page 3

Tom Griffiths is the director of aquatics at PSU. His speciality, the subject of his books and
published papers, is the pool itself. He has 2 daughters who went through the local swim clubs at
the schools and are now swimming competitively at collegiate level. His experience is extensive. I
asked him if swimming in chlorininated pools seems to be a cause of asthma. His answer was an
emphatic yes, his guess was at least 5% and perhaps as many as 10% of competitive swimmers of all
ages develop asthma. He said that this was his observation as well as what he has read. He added
that the problem is worse in energy efficient natatoriums, therefore terrible in our high school
where he expects a flurry of law suits sooner rather than later, but that it is not so prevalent at
the university pools because they are old and very inefficient, full of breezes that swooshes the
air up and out. Also, he uses volcanic ash in the filters which absorb the chloramines produced by
mixing chlorine with sweat, etc. He added that the chloramine dense air is heavier than normal air
and therefore floats right above the surface of the water and is absorbed in greater quantities by
competitive swimmers who are naturally inhaling more due to greater effort than by recreational
swimmmers.

Ruth Kazez

Thanks, Ruth. That was some VERY compelling information. This is exactly the situation HERE, as I
understand it. What's to be done about it? Who does one talk to about "the chloramine problem"? The
Aquatics Manager at the pool? The Head of Parks and Rec? The mayor? The local taxpayers (who may end
up footing the bill for switching over to ozone)? The Federal Government? Maybe Lesko came get me a
little grant money to pursue this changeover.

We have a beautiful municipal pool in town just turning 25 years old - in its prime! It's used by a
huge cross section of people from public school children to private birthday parties, scuba classes
to swim lessons, one swim club, one group of kayakers, TWO high school teams, a fair number of lap
swimmers, etc.

Is our town better off if we shut it down until there's money to make it safer?What if no one steps
forward to pay for the conversation?

Has anyone forced a municipality to switch to safer bromine or ozone systems?

I'm at a complete loss on this one. Any suggestions, anyone?

Regards,

Scott

Scott Lemley wrote: ..........
> Has anyone forced a municipality to switch to safer bromine or ozone systems?
>
> I'm at a complete loss on this one. Any suggestions, anyone?

My source,(Tom Griffiths, Ed.D., author of Better Beaches, Sport SCUBA Diving in Depth, The
Swimming Pool and The Complete Swimming Pool Reference; The Five Minute Scanning Strategy; Griff's
Guard Station.), current director of aquatics at psu, scowled mightily when I mentioned bromine.
He explained that it is a serious irritant. Ozone apparently is the gold standard and priced off
the scale.

Ruth Kazez

On Thu, 18 Dec 2003 13:00:05 GMT, rtk
<exk7remove@psu.edu> wrote:

>My source,(Tom Griffiths, Ed.D., author of Better Beaches, Sport SCUBA Diving in Depth, The
>Swimming Pool and The Complete Swimming Pool Reference; The Five Minute Scanning Strategy; Griff's
>Guard Station.), current director of aquatics at psu, scowled mightily when I mentioned bromine.
>He explained that it is a serious irritant. Ozone apparently is the gold standard and priced off
>the scale.

I briefly swam at PSU-Altoona (my wife was on the faculty) which they told me was bromine. I seemed
to get sicker there than anywhere else, so I always assumed bromine to be less effective.

Speaking of the "gold standard," in about 1985 a vendor came to our office and presented a system
where molecules of gold were slowly released into pool water. They claimed it was much more
effective than chlorine, but I have heard nothing in all the years since.

Donal Fagan AIA Donal@DonalO'Fagan.com (Anglicise the name to reply by e-mail)