Pollution could lead to cognitive decline

A recent study has revealed that long term exposure to air pollution could lead to cognitive decline in older adults.

The study, published in Archives of Internal Medicine, accompanies three other pollution-related tests recently conducted around the world that have linked exposure to pollution to health impacts.  Two studies have linked pollution with cardiovascular risks, with PM 2.5 particles indicated to be the most detrimental in all the studies.

Higher exposure to both PM 2.5 to 10 and PM 2.5 were linked to significantly faster cognitive decline in the most recent study. Women were found to be most vulnerable to the effects of high pollution on the brain. The academics looked at 19,409 women in America between the ages 70 to 81 during the study, which is the latest indicator of the adverse effects of pollution.

Dr Jennifer Weuve, an assistant professor at the Rush Institute for Healthy Aging at Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, said: "Cognitively speaking, this higher exposure is as if you had aged an extra two years."

"That could just delay the onset of dementia by two years, that would spare the population millions of cases of disease over the next 40 years."

Posted by Joseph Hutton