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Air pollution linked to dementia and cardiovascular disease:
The number of people living with dementia is projected to triple in the next 30 years. No curative treatment has been identified and the search for modifiable risk and protective factors remains a public health priority. Recent studies have linked both cardiovascular disease and air pollution to the development of dementia, but findings on the air pollution-link have been scarce and inconsistent.
In this study, the researchers examined the link between long-term exposure to air pollution and dementia and what role cardiovascular diseases play in that association. Almost 3,000 adults with an average age of 74 and living in the Kungsholmen district in central Stockholm were followed for up to 11 years. Of those, 364 people developed dementia. The annual average level of particulate matter 2.5 microns or less in width (PM2.5) are considered low compared to international standards.
"Interestingly, we were able to establish harmful effects on human health at levels below current air pollution standards," says first author Giulia Grande, researcher at the Department of Neurobiology, Care Sciences and Society at Karolinska Institutet. "Our findings suggest air pollution does play a role in the development of dementia, and mainly through the intermediate step of cardiovascular disease and especially stroke."
Journal Reference:
Giulia Grande, Petter L. S. Ljungman, Kristina Eneroth, Tom Bellander, Debora Rizzuto. Association Between Cardiovascular Disease and Long-term Exposure to Air Pollution With the Risk of Dementia. JAMA Neurology, 2020; DOI: 10.1001/jamaneurol.2019.4914
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday March 31 2020, @05:46PM (3 children)
Better than what? The EPA is notoriously toothless, more an organization to point to when people shout "why aren't we doing something?!?" than actually trying to protect health / environment from industry. Like all such organizations, it has also become a bludgeon to smack people around with, people who aren't in the good graces of those in charge.
Sometimes, like the Deepwater Horizon, industry will screw up so badly that they let themselves out of the good graces of the politicians, but even then the repercussions are weak tea compared to the profits generated by operating with "acceptable risk."
On balance, we're better off with the EPA than we would have been with nothing, it has been a long time since a river caught fire, but they draw the ire of business far too easily and the politicians are too quick to smack the EPA around to win points with businesses who are far more important to their political future than something as nebulous as "people's health."
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 4, Informative) by DeathMonkey on Tuesday March 31 2020, @06:05PM
Trump eases regulations adopted after BP Deepwater Horizon disaster [theguardian.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Wednesday April 01 2020, @03:46PM (1 child)
Spoken like someone who hasn't had the EPA fuck him over yet. I guess your property doesn't have wetlands.
The EPA is toothless until you trip over one of the conditions that allow for its interference. Then it grows a lot of teeth.
Maybe. It's definitely responsible for an order of magnitude or more drop in pollution since the 1960s. But it's also responsible for a huge portion of the growth in federal government level regulation and helping to move industry to the developing world.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Wednesday April 01 2020, @05:53PM
Toothless was an overly simplified analogy.... Toothless like an old buffalo: when your are mouse sized by comparison, the toothless EPA buffalo can dump a very hurtful load of shit on your head. However, the toothless old buffalo isn't much threat to Texas Longhorn Bulls that outweigh it 10:1 (being, of course, oil companies and the political power they wield, as compared to the EPA's budget, manpower, and political backing - maybe 100:1 is a more accurate ratio.)
🌻🌻 [google.com]