A new study has revealed that people living in a highly polluted area have a higher likelihood of suffering from mental health issues than those living in environments with cleaner air.
The study was published in the JAMA Psychiatry journal on Wednesday.
The findings showed that people who were exposed to higher amounts of multiple air pollutants for a prolonged period – including particle pollution, nitrogen dioxide and nitrogen oxides – had an increased risk of depression and anxiety.
According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, particular pollution, which can come in form of dirt, dust, soot, or smoke, is the mix of solid and liquid droplets floating in the air.
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Nitrogen dioxide pollution is most associated with traffic-related combustion byproducts. Nitrogen oxides are also released from traffic, as well as the burning of oil, coal, and natural gas.
Researchers looked at the records of 389,185 people from the UK Biobank, a large-scale biomedical database of half a million diverse volunteers. During the study period, 13,131 were diagnosed with depression and 15,835 were diagnosed with anxiety.
Those who lived in areas with higher pollution levels were at higher risk for depression and anxiety, even when the pollution levels were below UK air quality standards.
One Dr. Marianthi-Anna Kioumourtzoglou, an associate professor of environmental health sciences at Columbia’s Mailman School of Public Health, in reference to her past work related to this new study, said that pollution can affect the onset of anxiety and depression.
“There have been several studies that show that air pollution is also associated with exacerbation. So, for example, if there’s air pollution today and yesterday, then we see an uptake in our hospital admissions for these disorders,” Kioumourtzoglou said.
She and her colleagues have also found links with other neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s.
“The link between air pollution and the brain has now been pretty consistent in the literature,” Kioumourtzoglou added.
“Not all air pollutants are created equal. Some are more toxic than others. And for certain diseases, there’s still a lot of work to be done,” Kioumourtzoglou said.