Inhaling Boston Air is Equal to Smoking Cigarettes

By FRANK O’LAUGHLIN (Patch Staff)

Living the City of Boston is equivalent to smoking five cigarettes a year, according to an online tool backed by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Smoking may be banned in bars, restaurants and a slew of other public locations in Boston, but the degree of pollutants in the air is severely unhealthy.

A new interactive map tool known as “Share My Air” from Vivergy, helps people gauge their negative impact on local health through air pollution contributions.

The Share My Air tool measures data averaged over a 24-hour period. The open-source platform updates throughout the day as it draws in new air quality measurements. This data came from 3 p.m. Friday afternoon.

According to the tool, living in Boston for a year and breathing the air, is also equal to living with a smoker for three months. Just one month equates to spending 20 minutes in a car with a smoker each day.

The EPA AirNow database provides the tool with its air quality measurements.