More Chinese cities are issuing their first red alerts for pollution in response to forecasts of heavy smog, after the capital, Beijing, issued two this month following criticism for not releasing them earlier.

Shandong province in eastern China issued alerts in four cities after warning that the density of particulate matter in the air would exceed high levels for more than 24 hours. The Shandong environmental protection bureau said the alerts started Thursday morning and that kindergarten, primary and middle schools should close and construction of buildings and roads, and demolition work, should stop.

China’s air pollution is notorious after three decades of breakneck economic growth. In recent years, the government has said it is trying to address the problem as citizens have become increasingly aware of the dangers.

Meteorological authorities in Hebei, a province which neighbours Beijing and is regarded as China’s most polluted, issued its first red alert for smog on Tuesday.

Cities in Hebei took response measures. Xingtai and Handan instigated traffic control measures to take half the vehicles off the road on a given day, according to Hebei’s environmental protection bureau.



The first red alert in the port city of Tianjin, which is also close to Beijing, ended Thursday morning after three days.



Beijing issued its first two red alerts in December under a four-tier warning system that has been in place for two years. It had earlier experienced more hazardous levels of pollution, but environmental authorities said that their forecasting model must predict three or more days of smog at particular levels on the city’s air quality index. </s> BEIJING: Hospital visits spiked, roads were closed and flights cancelled Monday as China choked under a vast cloud of toxic smog, with forecasters warning the worse was yet to come.

At least 23 cities in the world’s most populous country have issued red alerts for air pollution since Friday, according to the official Xinhua news agency.

A host of emergency measures have been implemented to protect the public’s health from the smog, which is smothering almost a ninth of the entire country.

On Monday morning—the fourth day of the alert which is scheduled to end on Wednesday—Beijing’s air quality was better than feared, with PM 2.5 levels hovering around 200, according to data maintained by the US Embassy.

However, the figure remained eight times the World Health Organization’s daily recommended maximum exposure level to the microscopic particles that carry major health risks.

And the relatively low number was just a temporary reprieve, Beijing’s meteorological authority told Agence France-Presse, adding that the worst haze would hit the city Monday night and linger until Tuesday.

In neighboring Shijiazhuang, the capital of Hebei province, PM 2.5 levels stood as high as 701 at noon, with levels of larger PM 10 particles even higher.

In the port city of Tianjin, where readings for PM 2.5 climbed over 400 early in the morning, more than 180 flights had been cancelled and around 60 delayed since the alert began, according to national broadcaster CCTV.

Highways in the city were also closed, it said.

Several large hospitals in Tianjin saw a surge in the number of patients with respiratory diseases like asthma, according to the People’s Daily.

A red alert, issued when severe smog is expected to last more than 72 hours, is the highest of Beijing’s four-tiered, color-coded warning system.

The capital issued its first ever-red alert last year in December since the adoption of an emergency response program for air pollution in 2013, despite frequent bouts of serious smog.

Most of China’s smog is blamed on the burning of coal for electricity and heating, which spikes when demand peaks in winter.

The issue is a source of enduring public anger in China, where fast economic growth in recent decades has come at the cost of widespread environmental degradation. AFP </s> (CNN) A dangerous gray haze descended on Northeast China over the weekend, choking off schools, flights and industry and endangering citizens simply trying to breathe, according to local reports.

China saw the smog coming and last week issued its first red alert of the year for 23 cities.

As of Saturday, the smog covered 10.1 million square kilometers (3.9 million square miles), according to the country's Ministry of Environmental Protection.

That's roughly the area of the United States.

Tianjin Binhai International Airport, a major air cargo center, suspended service from Sunday evening to mid-morning Monday, resulting in the cancellation of 131 flights and 75 delays, Xinhua said.

Beijing, the capital, also restricted automobile traffic, while in Shandong Province, down the coast from Tianjin, officials closed toll gates on four expressways. Flights were also delayed in Shandong.

Other measures undertaken by affected cities include suspending construction projects, canceling classes for kindergartens and primary schools and closing or reducing production at some factories. The measure affected 1,200 factories in the capital alone, the Ministry of Environmental Protection reported, citing the China Securities Journal.

The situation is so dire that it's created a spate of "smog refugees" who are fleeing Beijing for cleaner air to the south, according to the South China Morning Post . With the exception of first-class seats, tickets to resort areas in Yunnan and Fujian provinces are almost sold out, the paper reported.

Cities along the Yellow Sea coast -- including Beijing and Tianjin, along with the provinces of Shandong, Hebei, and, further inland, Shanxi and Henan -- were among the hardest-hit locales . But unhealthy smog levels -- specifically, air quality index values higher than 350 -- were detected as far southwest as Chengdu and as far northeast as Jixi.

Beijing issues red alerts when pollutants are forecast to push the air-quality index higher than 200 for at least four days, above 300 for two or more days or higher than 500 for 24 hours.

Some cities had pockets where air pollution was off the charts. Literally.

While the air-quality index used by the US Environmental Protection Agency stops at 500, several Chinese cities had readings that far surpassed that number as of early Tuesday.

Not over yet

To put those numbers in perspective, India, Kosovo and Macedonia had areas where pollution levels topped 300 late Monday (and Sanliurfa, Turkey, and three cities in Mexico had scores higher than 860), but nowhere monitored by the World Air Quality Index Project had numbers anywhere near China's.

The highest UK score Monday was a 142 in Stanford-le-Hope, east of London, and the highest U.S. score was a 168 in Seeley, Montana, according to the project map, which focuses more heavily on North America, Europe and Asia than it does other continents.

While China's Ministry of Environmental Protection reported improvements in air quality in some cities, the red alerts are expected to stay in effect until Wednesday because of weather conditions that are preventing the pollution from dissipating.
Sixty cities in the People's Republic of China issued smog alerts between December 2 and 4.