Air Pollution Associated With Heart Disease, Stroke

Air pollution can lead to hardening of arteries, according to a new study. Researchers say that exposure to some particles in air is associated with an increased risk of heart attack and stroke.

Researchers found that fine particulate (PM2.5) air pollution was associated with thickening of the common carotid artery that provides blood to the head, neck and brain. The study was led by Sara Adar, Assistant Professor of Epidemiology, University of Michigan School of Public Health, and Joel Kaufman, Professor of Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences and Medicine, University of Washington.

Researchers also found that reducing exposure to these particles could lower the thickening of the arteries and in the long run, lower the risk of heart disease.

The study was based on data obtained from more than 5,300 people who were between 45 and 84 years old. These people were part of the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis and Air Pollution (MESA Air).

Researchers found that even after adjusting for others factors such as smoking, the thickness of the carotid vessel increased by 14 µm each year due to exposure to air pollution. People living in densely polluted areas had faster thickening compared with people who lived in areas that were less polluted.

"Our findings help us to understand how it is that exposures to air pollution may cause the increases in heart attacks and strokes observed by other studies," Adar said.

"Linking these findings with other results from the same population suggests that persons living in a more polluted part of town may have a 2 percent higher risk of stroke as compared to people in a less polluted part of the same metropolitan area," Adar added, according to a news release.

Previous research by researchers at MIT had found that more people in the U.K. die from air pollution than road accidents. This study appeared in the journal Environment Science and Technology.

The current study is published in the journal PLOS Medicine.