[CPEO-BIF] Urban air

[Lenny Siegel <lsiegel@cpeo.org>]

Press release
Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health
April 25, 2006

In utero exposure to urban air pollutants can increase risk
Prenatal exposure to air pollutants in New York City can adversely 
affect child development, according to the results of a study released 
today by the Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health (CCCEH) 
at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. Previous 
studies have shown that the same air pollutants can reduce fetal growth 
(both weight and head circumference at birth), but this study, which 
examined a group of the same children at three years of age, is the 
first to reveal that those pollutants can also affect cognitive 
development during childhood.

The study will be published online Monday, April 24, 2006, and can be 
accessed at the following URL: 
http://www.ehponline.org/docs/2006/9084/abstract.html.

Investigators at the Center studied a sample of 183 three-year-old 
children of non-smoking African-American and Dominican women residing in 
the neighborhoods of Washington Heights, Central Harlem, and the South 
Bronx. They found that exposure during pregnancy to combustion-related 
urban air pollutants known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) 
were linked to significantly lower scores on mental development tests 
and more than double the risk of developmental delay at age three. Such 
delay in cognitive development is indicative of greater risk for 
performance deficits in language, reading, and math in the early school 
years.

In the study, the mothers' exposure during pregnancy to varying levels 
of airborne PAHs was measured by personal air monitoring. PAHs enter the 
environment when combustion occurs – such as from car, truck, or bus 
engines, residential heating, power generation, or tobacco smoking. 
Following inhalation by the mother, the pollutants can be transferred 
across the placenta to reach the fetus. Children were tested at age 
three using a standardized test of mental and psychomotor development.

For the entire press release, see
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2006-04/cums-iue042506.php

--


Lenny Siegel
Director, Center for Public Environmental Oversight
c/o PSC, 278-A Hope St., Mountain View, CA 94041
Voice: 650/961-8918 or 650/969-1545
Fax: 650/961-8918
<lsiegel@cpeo.org>
http://www.cpeo.org


_______________________________________________
Brownfields mailing list
Brownfields@list.cpeo.org
http://www.cpeo.org/mailman/listinfo/brownfields