This Friday, November 4, 2022, Meteo France placed 26 departments in yellow vigilance “violent wind”. It will blow hard on the Atlantic coast and along the Mediterranean.
The winds should therefore be blowing very strong for the start of the Route du Rhum race, requiring the participating skippers to adopt extreme vigilance.
THE wind is a meteorological phenomenon present in all seasons. It can be hot or cold, moderate or violent, constant or even sudden. One thing is certain, it greatly influences our health! As Edwin Grant Dexter explains in his book Weather Influencethe wind irritates the skin and will thus alter the neurotransmitters of the brain and thus stimulate adrenaline, a hormone linked to aggressiveness and hostility.
When it’s windy, the body must adapt to a new state of the atmosphere. He will put in place new reflexes: in the resistance phase, he will thus consume more energy and the heart rate and blood pressure will increase. Obviously, beyond a certain power, it is obviously advisable to take shelter.
Also, a light but constant wind can trigger muscle stiffness. For example, if you work in a draft or near a fan, your muscles tense and you may suffer from spasms or stiff necks.
The wind carries external pathogenic factors
The wind, as a meteorological phenomenon, does not cause illness but it is the air carried by it that can be good or harmful to health. It can thus transport other external pathogenic factors which could penetrate inside the body and infiltrate our organism.
It has thus been proven that in winter, the cold wind can more easily transport microbes, bacteria and even viruses over long distances. Numerous studies have shown that the virus can take advantage of prevailing winds to spread. In 1981, foot-and-mouth disease infected French and English farms 280 kilometers apart. In 2012, winds also transported a microbe to the United States.
While in the spring, it can make pollen grains travel and make them fall in distant regions and thus make the most allergic people suffer.
The sea breeze has health benefits
Depending on where it comes from, the wind can also have different effects on health. It is thus proven thata wind coming from the ocean, the sea, also called “sea breeze”, will be charged with negative ions. These molecules present in the air, and also called air vitamins”, improve our mood, our tone, the quality of our sleep, concentration, oxygenation of our tissues… Negative ions would also make us less vulnerable to stress.
Also, as the biometeorologist Gilles Brien points out in his book “human barometers”, people who live constantly exposed to coastal winds, would also be known to be less prone to colds and flu.
On the contrary, the land wind, often hotter, would be loaded with positive ions, known to be harmful to health. Studies conducted by the Israeli biometeorologist Félix Shulman confirm that the Sharav, a hot and dry wind, would indeed be a generator of positive ions. This is also the case with the Foehn, a violent, hot and dry wind which descends the slopes of the mountains and which can cause headaches, irritability and even depressive states.
