Meta-Analysis: Air Pollutants Raise Short-Term Risk for MI

February 14th, 2012

Meta-Analysis: Air Pollutants Raise Short-Term Risk for MI

Larry Husten, PHD

Air pollution significantly raises the short-term, 7-day risk for MI, according to a new meta-analysis published in JAMA. Hazrije Mustafic and colleagues analyzed data from 34 studies and found a significant increase in the relative risk (RR) for MI with all the main air pollutants except ozone:

carbon monoxide: RR 1.048, CI 1.026-1.070
nitrogen dioxide: 1.011, 1.006-1.016
sulfur dioxide: 1.010, 1.003- 1.017
particulate matter ≤10 µm : 1.006, 1.002-1.009
particulate matter ≤2.5 µm: 1.025, 1.015-1.036
ozone: 1.003, 0.997-1.010

The authors acknowledge that the magnitude of increased risk was small, but calculated that because of the broad exposure of the population to air pollution, the attributable fraction ranged from 0.6% to 4.5% for the different pollutants.

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February 14th, 2012