Exposure to cooking fuels and birth weight in Lanzhou, China: a birth cohort study

• Published in: BMC public health 2015-07, Vol.15 (1), p.712-712, Article 712
• Main Authors: Jiang, Min, Qiu, Jie, Zhou, Min, He, Xiaochun, Cui, Hongmei, Lerro, Catherine, Lv, Ling, Lin, Xiaojuan, Zhang, Chong, Zhang, Honghong, Xu, Ruifeng, Zhu, Daling, Dang, Yun, Han, Xudong, Zhang, Hanru, Bai, Haiya, Chen, Ya, Tang, Zhongfeng, Lin, Ru, Yao, Tingting, Su, Jie, Xu, Xiaoying, Liu, Xiaohui, Wang, Wendi, Wang, Yueyuan, Ma, Bin, Qiu, Weitao, Zhu, Cairong, Wang, Suping, Huang, Huang, Zhao, Nan, Li, Xiaosong, Liu, Qing, Zhang, Yawei
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Age; Air pollution; Analysis; Biomass; Birth defects; Birth Weight; Child care; China - epidemiology; Coal; Coal - adverse effects; Coal - statistics & numerical data; Cohort Studies; Confidence intervals; Cooking; Cooking - statistics & numerical data; Electromagnetic Radiation; Epidemiology; Family income; Female; Fetal Growth Retardation - epidemiology; Forecasts and trends; Health aspects; Health risk assessment; Hospitals; Households; Humans; Infant, Low Birth Weight; Infant, Newborn; Infant, Premature; Male; Medical records; Menstruation; Multiple births; Natural Gas - statistics & numerical data; Nitrogen dioxide; Outdoor air quality; Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons; Population; Pregnancy; Premature Birth - epidemiology; Prenatal Exposure Delayed Effects - epidemiology; Studies; Ventilation; Womens health; Young Adult
• ISSN: 1471-2458; 1471-2458
• DOI: 10.1186/s12889-015-2038-1

Early studies have suggested that biomass cooking fuels were associated with increased risk of low birth weight (LBW). However it is unclear if this reduced birth weight was due to prematurity or intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR). In order to understand the relationship between various cooking fuels and risk of LBW and small for gestational age (SGA), we analyzed data from a birth cohort study conducted in Lanzhou, China which included 9,895 singleton live births. Compared to mothers using gas as cooking fuel, significant reductions in birth weight were observed for mothers using coal (weight difference = 73.31 g, 95 % CI: 26.86, 119.77) and biomass (weight difference = 87.84 g, 95 % CI: 10.76, 164.46). Using biomass as cooking fuel was associated with more than two-fold increased risk of LBW (OR = 2.51, 95 % CI: 1.26, 5.01), and the risk was mainly seen among preterm births (OR = 3.43, 95 % CI: 1.21, 9.74). No significant associations with LBW were observed among mothers using coal or electromagnetic stoves for cooking. These findings suggest that exposure to biomass during pregnancy is associated with risk of LBW, and the effect of biomass on LBW may be primarily due to prematurity rather than IUGR.