Stories BY CHIOMA OBINNA

Traffic congestion is a phenomenon common to major cities of the world, Lagos inclusive. Driving through Lagos roads especially during peak periods of 4.00 P.M. till about 10.00 P.M. is not only time-consuming but hazardous. Road users are exposed to series of life-threatening conditions such as cardiovascular diseases. Apart from the dangerous potholes on the major roads, it is obvious that poor respect for traffic rules and regulations among the road users contribute a lot to the menace.

Although, critical observers agree that man-hours lost on these roads may be unquantifiable, medical experts say road users along these congested roads run more risk than imagined. Air pollution, one of the major hazards of traffic congestion, affects the respiratory tract,causes irritation, headache, fatigue, asthma, high blood pressure, heart diseases and cancer. Experts say if the trend persists, the incidence of exposure to the indicated ailments and other health complications could become even more significant.

Concerned citizens say the trend of massive traffic congestion taking its toll on human health should be curtailed. Apart from the risk of diseases, many have lost their lives in the course of stretched-out gridlocks. The experience on these roads is better imagined than witnessed. It is either a case of a truck losing its brakes, or a fuel tanker going up in flames. Armed robbery attacks on road users are another aspect of the matter.

One of the routes notoriously prone to traffic snarls is the Oshodi -Apapa expressway. Almost no day passes that commuters plying this route would not have a bitter experience to share. But the gridlock of

Friday last week on that route has been described as the “mother of all traffic jams”. This was the description by Kehinde Olubanjo, an artisan who travels on this route daily to his office at Wharf.

Narrating his experience, he said:“This is the worst traffic jam I have experienced in all my 25 years in Lagos. I have been here since about 10.00 A.M., it is now 3.45 P.M. and the entire road remains blocked.

As it is already, the day is wasted. This is a sample of what many Lagosians face almost on daily basis. It is terrible.”

A study by Prof Adetayo Mabadeje with ambulating blood pressure monitoring, showed that blood pressures of the average Lagosian is highest between the closing “rush hour” period which indicates they aremost likely trapped in a traffic jam. The participants in the study wore the ambulating blood pressure monitoring machines for 24 hours.

Commenting on the situation, a Consultant Physician and Cardiologist, Prof. David Anthonio Oke says apart from the fact that an individual is stressed up in the gridlock, stress causes adrenalin rise which results to high blood pressure and also increases the blood sugar.

“For a hypertensive patient, the blood pressure will go higher. At the same time, road users are exposed to carbon monoxide poisoning because when you breath in the gridlock you are forced to breathe in a lot of carbon monoxide.

Oke, who is also the Chief Medical Director of the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH), warned that Carbon monoxide causes respiratory disorders and certain cancers in the upper part of the respiratory tract and in the liver. “These are complex things happening when you have such grid locks.

He stressed that not even motorists in an air conditioned cars are safe. “Some air conditioners stifle the air, while others cool you and you feel drowsy.

“But the question is, how many Nigerians can afford the type of air-conditioned cars capable of stifling the air during gridlocks? The richer you are, the more expensive a car you buy but the gridlock has a lot of impact on the health,” he said.

In the gridlock, the car exhaust fumes are a real menace because they are toxic at ground level. Exhausts from all internally combusted engines combine to produce local adverse effects on the health of car users and all innocent bystanders. Cities have become islands of toxic chemicals from the unrestrained use of vehicles burning fossil fuels.

Cars are noisy, ugly, often dangerous and dominate the experience of modern living. We are now used to the carnage on roads and highways- attempts to reduce death and disability from our motorized containers have not substantially altered the negative impact on society.

The adverse health effects of car exhaust are pervasive and difficult to measure, it is now left for our Government to protect the citizens by coming out with better policies and practically fixing all the bad roads that are major contributors to the heavy traffic jams on our roads.