The Relation between Respiratory Illness in Primary Schoolchildren and the Use of Gas for Cooking

Abstract

The study was designed to determine whether there was an association between indoor levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and respiratory illness and lung function in schoolchildren. NO2 was measured for one week in the winter outside and inside the homes of children aged 6-7 years living and attending primary schools in a defined 4 square km area in Middlesbrough, Cleveland, UK. Outdoor levels of NO2 measured at 75 points within the area ranged from 14-24 ppb weekly average. Measurements were also made in 428 kitchens with gas cookers, range 5-317 ppb, mean 112.2 ppb, and in 87 kitchens with electric cookers, range 6-188 ppb, mean 18.0 ppb. In a random subsample of homes the range of NO2 levels in 107 children's bedrooms in homes where gas was used for cooking was 4-169 ppb, mean 30.5 ppb, in 18 bedrooms in electric cooking homes the range was 3-37 ppb, mean 13.9 ppb. NO2 levels in the gas cooking kitchens were positively related to the presence of pilot lights, use of gas fires for main heating, number of regular smokers, and the number of people in the home. Information from 29 homes with the highest kitchen NO2 levels paired with 29 low NO2 gas cooking homes showed that the daily number of meals eaten and the frequency with which the cooker was used for heating and drying clothes were significantly greater in the high NO2 homes.

Effects of Indoor Environmental Factors on Respiratory Health of Children in a Subtropical Climate

“…They may be more susceptible to indoor environmental pollutants than adults, and the proportion of their time indoors is likely to be greater. Children may also be examined readily in large numbers through the schools.Indoor environmental factors that have received the most attention in the past are environmental tobacco smoke (Schenker et al, 1983;Charlton, 1984;Ware et al, 1984;Somerville et al, 1988;Chinn and Rona, 1991;Forastiere et al, 1992;Guneser et al, 1994;Goren and Hellmann, 1996) and directly or indirectly measured nitrogen dioxide, mainly from gas cooking appliances (Melia et al, 1979;Goldstein et al, 1979;Ware et al, 1984;Ogston et al, 1985;Neas et al, 1991). However, there are no data available concerning the investigations of the effects of indoor environment on the respiratory health of school children in a subtropical region.…”

Front-Door Concentrations and Personal Exposures of Danish Children to Nitrogen Dioxide

“…Passive smoking has not previously been reported to increase personal NO2 exposure, but the finding seems reliable because several studies have shown that smoking increases indoor NO2 concentrations (39,(42)(43)(44).…”

“…First, most of the effect of gas appliances was included via the effect of the NO2 concentration in the bedroom; removing the bedroom concentration from the regression model decreased the pvalue for gas appliances to <0.0001. Second, the highest NO2 concentrations have been reported from gas stoves with continuously burning pilot lights (28,39,40), which are rarely used in Denmark. Third, in contrast to most previous studies, we dealt only with children who might be expected to be less exposed than adults because 1) NO2 concentrations in the kitchens and living rooms of houses with gas stoves decrease with decreasing height (41) and 2) children spend less of the time than their mothers do in the kitchen (36).…”

The Estimation of Personal Exposures to Air Pollutants for a Community-Based Study of Health Effects in Asthmatics—Exposure Model

“…This source influence on NO2 has also been reported previously. 12 ' 13 The effects of both of these characteristics were included in the model by the use of four different regression relationships for the four possible combinations of cooking fuel (gas/ electric) and smoking (smoker/no smoker), as shown in Table I. These detrended regression coefficients were then used with indoor hour-specific means determined separately for each of the cooking/smoking subcategories (see Table I) along with the fixed site monitoring data in order to estimate indoor concentrations of nitrogen dioxide for the homes of all study subjects.…”