POLLUTING COOKING FUEL USERS MAY BE AT A HIGHER RISK OF COGNITIVE IMPAIRMENT FINDS STUDY IN KARNATAKA

The study, published in The Lancet found that users of only polluting cooking fuel, primarily rural women, had significantly lower scores in global cognition, visuospatial ability and executive functions

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A recent study published in The Lancet Regional Health - Southeast Asia has found that polluting cooking fuel users may be at a higher risk for cognitive impairment.

Highlighting the need for policies promoting the adoption of clean cooking fuel/technology, the study found that rural females, who tend to be more exposed than males, could have greater vulnerability to household air pollution's (HAP) adverse effects on the brain.

A team of researchers from the Centre for Brain Research at the Indian Institute of Science (IISc) in Bengaluru and University of Chicago, United States, used baseline data from participants of the ongoing prospective cohort study, Centre for Brain Research -

Srinivaspura Aging, Neuro Senescence, and COGnition (CBR-SANSCOG). Data was collected between January 2018 and December 2023. Under the CBR-SANSCOG cohort, adults aged over 45 years from the villages of Srinivaspura taluk in Kolar district of Karnataka were recruited. Of the sample size of 4,145 adults, as many as 994 participants who passed the MRI quality control were included in the MRI analysis.

HAP is a specific type of indoor air pollution, which primarily results from the use of polluting cooking technology - coal stoves, biomass stoves, chullahs (earthen stoves) and polluting fuels such as firewood, cow dung cake, coal, lignite or charcoal, and kerosene, in and around the house, leading to the production of gaseous toxins.