Austin air quality impacted by weather, smoke

AUSTIN, Texas - The hot and humid conditions are having an impact on air quality in Central Texas.

Here's a map that shows air quality across the country. Most of Central Texas is in the moderate range.

Experts say the haziness is caused by a combination of heat, humidity and sunshine, as well as agricultural burning in Mexico and a little bit of smoke from the wildfires in Canada.

"The humidity makes the smoke particles look worse," FOX 7 Austin meteorologist Carlo Falco said.

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Doctors say the air quality can affect your health if you're immunocompromised or have respiratory issues like asthma or emphysema. Skin irritation can also occur. If it bothers you, try to stay indoors if you can or wear a mask.

"Most people that have those underlying issues have inhalers, and you should make avail of those sooner than you normally would, but also seek evaluation for more aggressive therapy sooner than you typically would knowing what's going on in the air," Dr. Pradeep Kumar, senior physician at Austin Gastroenterology said.

Falco says haziness happens every year from routine pollution and wildfire season, but the size of the Canadian wildfires isn't normal.

"Smoke is going to be an issue off and on throughout the summer as an almost guarantee, telling when and how bad that smoke is going to be is virtually impossible to forecast until we find the wildfire source," he said.