Personal Injury: Air Pollution May Damage Women's Hearts

A study in the New England Journal of Medicine reveals that women living in places with elevated air pollution have an increased risk of heart disease and death. The pollution responsible for this elevated risk consists of invisible particles from traffic fumes, coal burning power plants and wood fires. The study indicates that the correlation of heart disease and the level of air pollution is much higher than originally thought. Researchers are hoping that this will bring greater attention to the dangers of air pollution. “Our findings show that both what city a woman lived in and where she lived in that city affected her exposure level and her disease risk,” said Kristin Miller, on of the authors of the paper from University of Washington.

Air Pollution Raises Risk of Heart Disease in Women

The study looked at information from 65,000 people between the ages of 50 to 79, in 36 cities across the United States. In the beginning, none of the woman showed signs of heart disease. However, after only nine years 1,816 had experienced a heart attack or stroke, needed heart bypass surgery or died because of cardiovascular failure. Scientists compared this data to the air quality at each of the woman’s homes. They discovered not only a connection, but it appears that “the magnitude of health effects may be larger than previously recognized.”

Sources of the air pollution in the study included automobile exhaust, coal burning power stations, wood burning stoves, and industrial plants. The most dangerous type of air pollution consists of tiny particles of soot and dust in the air. The particulate matter cannot be seen by the unaided eye, and can cause a haze over a city. Joel Kaufman, a professor of environmental and occupational health sciences, epidemiology and medicine said, “These soot particles, which are typically created by fossil-fuel combustion in vehicles and power plants, can contain a mix of chemicals. The tiny particle – and the pollutant gases that travel along with them – cause harmful effects once they are breathed in.” This contributes to increasing evidence that air pollution may be a serious risk factor for cardiovascular disease.