Rumor Doctor blog archive
Can you inhale a lump of feces from breathing the air at Kandahar Air Field?
Published: January 10, 2011
You may not want to eat as you read this.
As anyone who has been anywhere near Kandahar Air Field knows, the base has a lagoon of sewage roughly the size of Lake Michigan. Rumor has it there is so much airborne fecal matter coming from the “Poo Pond,” that after six months of living on the base you have inhaled a candy-bar-size lump of human waste.
The rumor has been brewing for a while. In 2004, the Air Force issued a fact sheet titled “Air Quality — Fecal Matter,” which says you are unlikely to catch a virus, bacteria or fungus from breathing in dust with dried stool, but you can still feel sick if you breathe enough of it.
“In very high amounts, breathing in organic matter can sometimes make a person feel ill like the flu, with fever, achiness, irritation of the eyes, nose and lungs, and a tight chest,” the fact sheet says. “However, it is only under extreme conditions where organic matter can cause this type of immune reaction.”
In Afghanistan, such a condition is known as the “Kabul Crud,” which comes in part from Afghans burning animal dung for heat. But Lt. Col. Webster Wright, spokesman for Regional Command-South, said the air quality at Kandahar Air Field is no worse than anywhere else in Afghanistan.
There are a couple places on base where the air is particularly hazardous, choked with “moon dust,” very fine dust found in Iraq and Afghanistan, or smoke from the trash-burning pit, Wright said in an e-mail. To cut down on the air pollution, an incinerator is being built to take care of the trash.
But inhaling a candy bar-sized lump of human waste? Is that even possible?
To find out, The Doctor turned to Dr. Mark Nicolls, associate professor of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Stanford School of Medicine.
“Interesting question,” he said in an e-mail. “I have not heard of this before. The answer is, I think, is that it would be highly unlikely for a candy-bar-sized lump (a la ‘Caddyshack’?) of fecal matter to accumulate in someone’s lung after breathing in organic matter that may contain fecal matter.”
The rumor supposedly comes from a study into airborne fecal matter at Kandahar Air Field conducted by one of the countries providing troops in Afghanistan, such as Australia. But NATO has no record of any country conducting such a study, Webster said.
“Short answer — that rumor is a bunch of crap,” he said, obviously not realizing that making jokes about sewage is The Doctor’s job
THE RUMOR DOCTOR’S DIAGNOSIS: This rumor is false, but there’s no doubt that the “Poo Pond” reeks worse than anything, with the possible exception of North Jersey.
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