According to the New York Post, citing EurekAlert, a new study has suggested that long-term exposure to air pollution is associated with weight gain in women, particularly women in their forties and fifties.
Researcher Shen Wang, a professor of epidemiology at the University of Michigan, says that women who have been observed have been exposed to poor air quality, particularly higher levels of fine particles, such as nitrogen dioxide and ozone, have undergone an increase in their body size.
Wang added that exposure to air pollution leads to higher body fat percentage and lower lean mass for middle-aged women, noting that “body fat increased by 4.5%, or about 1,” 20 kg “.
The data was collected from groups of 1,654 white, brown, Chinese and Japanese women, with an average age of 50, who were followed for eight years from 2000 to 2008.
Participants’ home addresses were used to measure relative air pollution around their homes, looking for links between environmental pollution and obesity.
The study results indicated that exercise and physical activity act as deterrents for the effects of air pollution. But because the study focused only on middle-aged women, Wang said, these findings cannot be generalized to younger or older women or men.
