Women living in parts of the United States with lower air quality, especially neighborhoods with heavy emissions from motor vehicles, are more likely to develop breast cancer, according to a multiyear analysis involving more than 400,000 women and 28,000 breast cancer cases.
Women living in parts of the United States with lower air quality, especially neighborhoods with heavy emissions from motor vehicles, are more likely to develop breast cancer, according to a multiyear analysis involving more than 400,000 women and 28,000 breast cancer cases.
The research, which included Veronica Irvin of the Oregon State University College of Health, was published in the American Journal of Public Health.
The project combined data from five large breast cancer studies conducted over multiple decades that tracked individuals even as they changed addresses and followed them for as long as 10 years prior to their diagnosis. The researchers overlaid outdoor air quality information from more than 2,600 monitors to look for an association between air pollution and breast cancer.
The scientists found that a 10-parts-per-billion increase in nitrogen dioxide concentrations in the air equated to a 3% increase in overall breast cancer incidence; nitrogen dioxide is a proxy for pollution from car traffic, Irvin said, and based on the estimated 316,950 cases of female breast cancer expected to be diagnosed in the United States this year, a 3% reduction would mean 9,500 fewer cases.
Read More at: Oregon State University
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