Air pollution from traffic and cancer incidence: a Danish cohort study
Open Access
- 19 July 2011
- journal article
- research article
- Published by Springer Science and Business Media LLC in Environmental Health
- Vol. 10 (1), 67
- https://doi.org/10.1186/1476-069x-10-67
Abstract
Vehicle engine exhaust includes ultrafine particles with a large surface area and containing absorbed polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, transition metals and other substances. Ultrafine particles and soluble chemicals can be transported from the airways to other organs, such as the liver, kidneys, and brain. Our aim was to investigate whether air pollution from traffic is associated with risk for other cancers than lung cancer. We followed up 54,304 participants in the Danish Diet Cancer and Health cohort for 20 selected cancers in the Danish Cancer Registry, from enrolment in 1993-1997 until 2006, and traced their residential addresses from 1971 onwards in the Central Population Registry. We used modeled concentration of nitrogen oxides (NOx) and amount of traffic at the residence as indicators of traffic-related air pollution and used Cox models to estimate incidence rate ratios (IRRs) after adjustment for potential confounders. NOx at the residence was significantly associated with risks for cervical cancer (IRR, 2.45; 95% confidence interval [CI], 1.01;5.93, per 100 μg/m3 NOx) and brain cancer (IRR, 2.28; 95% CI, 1.25;4.19, per 100 μg/m3 NOx). This hypothesis-generating study indicates that traffic-related air pollution might increase the risks for cervical and brain cancer, which should be tested in future studies.Keywords
This publication has 58 references indexed in Scilit:
- Lung Cancer Incidence and Long-Term Exposure to Air Pollution from TrafficEnvironmental Health Perspectives, 2011
- Postmenopausal Breast Cancer Is Associated with Exposure to Traffic-Related Air Pollution in Montreal, Canada: A Case–Control StudyEnvironmental Health Perspectives, 2010
- Effect of prolonged exposure to diesel engine exhaust on proinflammatory markers in different regions of the rat brainParticle and Fibre Toxicology, 2010
- Associations between Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon–Related Exposures and p53 Mutations in Breast TumorsEnvironmental Health Perspectives, 2010
- Ambient air pollution and brain cancer mortalityCancer Causes & Control, 2009
- Social inequality and incidence of and survival from tumours of the central nervous system in a population-based study in Denmark, 1994–2003European Journal Of Cancer, 2008
- Brain tumor epidemiology: Consensus from the Brain Tumor Epidemiology ConsortiumCancer, 2008
- Exposure to diesel exhaust induces changes in EEG in human volunteersParticle and Fibre Toxicology, 2008
- DNA damage in rats after a single oral exposure to diesel exhaust particlesMutation Research, 2008
- Occupational exposures to polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, and respiratory and urinary tract cancers: a quantitative review to 2005Annals Of Oncology, 2006