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Traffic fumes can trigger heart attacks

Breathing in large amounts of traffic fumes can trigger a heart attack up to six hours after exposure, according to research which reaffirms the health risks associated with pollution.
The study, in the British Medical Journal, found that high levels of pollution can increase the risk of suffering a heart attack. It identifies exposure to pollutant particles and nitrogen dioxide expelled by cars, which are both markers of contaminated urban atmospheres, as the main culprits.
The authors quantify the risk as small – up to 1.3% higher risk of a heart attack up to six hours after exposure to those substances. But they say that getting enough of those two substances into the lungs can bring forward by a few hours a heart attack that would have happened anyway. This is called short-term displacement or the “harvesting” effect of pollution.
Krishnan Bhaskaran and six colleagues at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine examined 79,288 heart attacks that occurred in 15 urban areas of England and Wales in 2003-06, from the Myocardial Ischaemia National Audit Project. They then examined how much pollution occurred in those areas at the time those patients suffered their heart attack, using data from UK National Air Quality Archive.
They studied levels of carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide and ozone as well as pollutant particles, known as PM10, and nitrogen dioxide or NO2.
Pollution is estimated to cause 29,000 premature deaths a year in the UK, including 4,200 in London alone, said Jenny Bates, an air pollution campaigner at Friends of the Earth.
– from guardian.co.uk

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