BACKGROUND By 2050, nearly 70% of the global population is projected to live in urban areas. Because the environments we inhabit affect our health, urban and transport designs that promote healthy living are needed. OBJECTIVE We estimated the number of premature deaths preventable under compliance with international exposure recommendations for physical activity (PA), air pollution, noise, he...

PURPOSE To examine the association between household use of biomass fuels for cooking and birth weight. METHODS Analysis is based on 3559 childbirths in the 5 years preceding the 1999 Zimbabwe Demographic and Health Survey. Birth weights, recorded by trained professionals at local health clinics, were derived from health cards at home or from mother's recall. Multiple regression method was us...

Benzene is a solvent strictly related to some industrial activities and to automotive emissions. After the reduction in lead content of fuel gasoline, and the consequent decrease in octane number, an increase in benzene and other aromatic hydrocarbons in gasoline occurred. Therefore, an increase in the concentration of these chemicals in the air as primary pollutants and as precursors of photoc...

BACKGROUND Air pollution is associated with asthma exacerbations. We examined the associations of exposure to ambient particulate matter (PM10) and nitrogen dioxide (NO2) with the risk of wheezing in preschool children, and assessed whether these associations were modified by tobacco smoke exposure. METHODS This study was embedded in the Generation R Study, a population-based prospective coho...

All combustion processes produce primary and secondary submicrometric aerosol particles. Primary particles are produced directly by incomplete combustion, and secondary particles are formed from gas-phase precursors. When diffused into the atmosphere, each particle is subject to different mechanisms, such as nucleation, condensation, coagulation and surface reaction, by colliding with other par...

OBJECTIVE To assess the impact of Mexico City and federal smoke-free legislation on secondhand tobacco smoke (SHS) exposure and support for smoke-free laws. MATERIAL AND METHODS Pre- and post-law data were analyzed from a cohort of adult smokers who participated in the International Tobacco Control (ITC) Policy Evaluation Suvey in four Mexican cities. For each indicator, we estimated prevalen...

This article reviews data from experimental and epidemiologic studies on passive smoking and makes 12 recommendations for further study. The physicochemical nature of passive smoke, the smoke inhaled by nonsmokers, differs significantly from the mainstream smoke inhaled by the active smoker. At present, measurement of urinary cotinine appears to be the best method of assessing exposures to pass...

OBJECTIVE This study of a birth cohort in the city of Tongliang in Chongqing, China, evaluated the relationship between two prenatal exposures (polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons(PAH) and environmental tobacco smoke(ETS)) and child intelligence quotient (IQ) as measured by the Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence at age 5 years. A coal-fired power plant was the major source of amb...

In September 2005 Thailand became the first Asian country to implement a complete ban on the display of cigarettes and other tobacco products at point-of-sale (POS). This paper examined the impact of the POS tobacco display ban in Thailand, with Malaysia (which did not impose bans) serving as a comparison. The data came from the International Tobacco Control Southeast Asia Survey (2005-2011), a...

BACKGROUND Recently, it has focused the role of exposure to environmental tobacco smoke in the etiology of dental caries, so we plan to evaluate the association between environmental tobacco smoke inhalation and caries experience in 10-15-years-old children. METHODS A transversal descriptive study was designed. Carried out in the Primary Dentistry Unit. 9th Health Department. Valencian Countr...