Association between household and outdoor air pollution and risk for metabolic syndrome among women in Beijing, China

ABSTRACT

This study explored whether household and outdoor air pollution is associated with a greater risk for metabolic syndrome (MetS) among women. In all 11,860 women who cooked with clean energy were included in the analysis. Cooking frequency, range hood use during cooking, passive smoking exposure, and solid fuel use for heating were used to represent household air pollution. The 2-year average concentration of PM_2.5, and face mask usage were used to reflect outdoor air pollution exposure. An index of air pollution exposure was also constructed. Multivariable logistic regression models were used to estimate the association between air pollution and risk for MetS, and a positive correlation was found. Our results indicated that household cooking used clean energy and exposure to a high level of outdoor PM_2.5 without face mask usage may contribute to an increased risk for MetS among women.

KEYWORDS:

• Air pollution
• household
• metabolic syndrome
• women
• Northern China

Acknowledgements

We would like to express our sincere thanks to the local research teams from 16 district of Beijing Centers for Disease Prevention and Control, and the participants of the study.

Disclosure statement

The authors have no relevant financial or non-financial interests to disclose.

Data availability statement

The data is not publicly available due to confidentiality.

Author contributions

Yushan Du analyzed the data, drafted the initial manuscript, and revised the manuscript.

Qingping Liu analyzed the data, drafted the initial manuscript, and contributed to the data acquisition.

Jing Du contributed to the project administration and investigation.

Bing Shao contributed to the resources and funding acquisition.

Chao Wang, Yang Liu, Yunping Shi and Ping Wang participated in the design of the project and contributed to data collection, curation and validation.

Zhiwen Li contributed to the supervision of this study, and reviewed the manuscript.

Gang Li contributed to funding acquisition, the supervision of this study, and reviewed the manuscript.

Jufen Liu contributed to the conceptualization of this study and critically revised the manuscript.

Our study was based on a well-organized population-based cohort study. There were 6 co-authors mainly responsible for the designing and conducting of the survey, and contributed to the data collection, curation and validation.

All authors contributed to the study conception and design, and commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by grants from the Research Special Fund for Municipal Medical Public Welfare Institute [No. 2017-BJYJ-15].