The first evidence that exceeding the World Health Organization (WHO) ozone limit is associated with substantial increases in hospital admissions for heart attack, heart failure and stroke is published today in European Heart Journal, a journal of the European Society of Cardiology (ESC).Even ozone levels below the WHO maximum were linked to worsening health.
«During this three-year study, ozone was responsible for an increasing proportion of cardiovascular disease admissions as time progressed,» said study author Professor Shaowei Wu of Xi’an Jiaotong University, China. «It is believed that climate change, by creating atmospheric conditions conducive to ozone formation, will continue to raise concentrations in many parts of the world. Our results indicate that older people are particularly vulnerable to the adverse cardiovascular effects of ozone, meaning that worsening ozone pollution with climate change and the rapid aging of the world’s population may produce even greater risks of cardiovascular disease in the future.»
Ozone is a gas and the main air pollutant in photochemical smog.Ozone pollution is different from the ozone layer, which absorbs most of the sun’s ultraviolet radiation. Ozone pollution is formed when other pollutants react in the presence of sunlight. These other pollutants are volatile organic compounds and nitrogen oxides emitted by motor vehicles, power plants, industrial boilers, refineries, chemical plants, and facilities that burn biomass and fossil fuels. Previous studies have suggested that ozone pollution damages the heart and blood vessels, but there is limited and inconclusive evidence on its influence on cardiovascular disease risk.
This study examined the association between environmental ozone pollution and hospital admissions for cardiovascular disease. Data on daily hospital admissions for cardiovascular diseases during 2015 to 2017 in 70 cities in China were collected from the two major national health insurance systems.During the study period, the two databases covered approximately 258 million people in the 70 cities, equivalent to more than 18% of China’s population. Types of cardiovascular disease included coronary heart disease, stroke, and heart failure, in addition to subtypes such as angina, acute myocardial infarction, acute coronary syndrome, ischemic stroke, and hemorrhagic stroke.
Eight-hour maximum daily average concentrations of ozone, fine particulate matter (PM2.5), inhalable particulate matter (PM10), sulfur dioxide, nitrogen dioxide and carbon monoxide were obtained for each city from China’s National Urban Air Quality Real-Time Publication Platform.
During the study period, there were 6,444,441 hospital admissions for cardiovascular disease in the 70 cities and the average maximum daily ozone concentration in eight hours was 79.2 μg/m3.Environmental ozone exposure was associated with increased hospital admissions for all cardiovascular diseases studied, except hemorrhagic stroke, independent of other air pollutants. For example, each 10 μg/m3 increase in the two-day average of peak ozone concentration over eight hours was associated with a 0.40% increase in hospital admissions for stroke and a 0.75% increase for acute myocardial infarction.
Source — https://www.intramed.net/103838