Ambient Air Pollution and Adult Asthma Incidence in Six European Cohorts (ESCAPE)

Bénédicte Jacquemin (1, 1, 2, 3, 4) , Valérie Siroux (5) , Margaux Sanchez (1, 1, 2, 3) , Anne-Elie Carsin (4) , Tamara Schikowski (6, 7, 8) , Martin Adam (6, 7) , Valeria Bellisario (9) , Anna Buschka (8) , Roberto Bono (9) , Bert Brunekreef (10, 10) , Yutong Cai (11) , Marta Cirach (4) , Françoise Clavel-Chapelon (2, 2) , Christophe Declercq (12) , Marco Roberto De (13) , Audrey de Nazelle (4, 14) , Regina E Ducret-Stich (6, 7) , Virginia Valeria Ferretti (15) , Margaret W Gerbase (16) , Rebecca Hardy (17) , Joachim Heinrich (18) , Christer Janson (19) , Deborah Jarvis (11, 20) , Zaina Al Kanaani (11) , Dirk Keidel (6, 7) , Diana Kuh (17) , Nicole Le Moual (1, 1, 2, 3) , Mark J Nieuwenhuijsen (4) , Alessandro Marcon (13) , Lars Modig (21) , Isabelle Pin (5, 22) , Thierry Rochat (16) , Christian Schindler (6, 7) , Dorothea Sugiri (8) , Morgane Stempfelet (12) , Sofia Temam (1, 1, 2, 3) , Ming-Yi Tsai (6, 7) , Raphaëlle Varraso (1, 1, 2, 3) , Danielle Vienneau (6, 7, 11) , Andrea Vierkötter (8) , Anna L Hansell (11, 23) , Ursula Krämer (8) , Nicole M Probst-Hensch (6, 7) , Jordi Sunyer (4) , Nino Künzli (6, 7) , Francine Kauffmann (2, 3)

1 VIMA - Vieillissement et Maladies chroniques : approches épidémiologique et de santé publique
2 CESP - Centre de recherche en épidémiologie et santé des populations
3 University of Versailles St.-Quentin, UMRS 1018, Villejuif
4 CREAL - Center for Research in Environmental Epidemiology
5 INSERM, IAB, Team of Environmental Epidemiology applied to Reproduction and Respiratory Health, Grenoble, France Université Grenoble Alpes, IAB, Team of Environmental Epidemiology applied to Reproduction and Respiratory Health, Grenoble, France CHU de Grenoble, IAB, Team of Environmental Epidemiology applied to Reproduction and Respiratory Health, Grenoble, France
6 Swiss TPH
7 Unibas - Université de Bâle = University of Basel = Basel Universität
8 IUF - Leibniz Research Institute for Environmental Medicine [Düsseldorf, Germany]
9 Department of Public Health and Pediatrics, University of Turin, Turin
10 Universiteit Utrecht / Utrecht University [Utrecht]
11 MRC-PHE Centre for Environment and Health, Imperial College, London
12 InVS, French Institute for Public Health Surveillance, Saint-Maurice
13 Unit of Epidemiology and Medical Statistics, Department of Public Health and Community Medicine, University of Verona, Verona
14 Centre for Environmental Policy, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Imperial College London, London
15 UNIPV - Università degli Studi di Pavia = University of Pavia
16 Division of Pulmonary Medicine, University Hospitals of Geneva, Geneva
17 MRC Unit for Lifelong Health and Ageing, Research Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, University College, London
18 Institute of Epidemiology, German Research Center for Environmental Health (GmbH), Helmholtz Zentrum München, Neuherberg
19 Department of Medical Sciences, Respiratory Medicine and Allergology, Uppsala University Hospital, Uppsala
20 Department of Respiratory Epidemiology & Public Health, Imperial College London, London
21 Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine Umeå University Hospital Umeå
22 Département de pédiatrie CHU Nord, Grenoble
23 Directorate of Public Health and Primary Care, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, The Bays, London

Background: Short-term exposure to air pollution has adverse effects among patients with asthma, but whether long-term exposure to air pollution is a cause of adult-onset asthma is unclear. Objective: We aimed to investigate the association between air pollution and adult onset asthma. Methods: Asthma incidence was prospectively assessed in six European cohorts. Exposures studied were annual average concentrations at home addresses for nitrogen oxides assessed for 23,704 participants (including 1,257 incident cases) and particulate matter (PM) assessed for 17,909 participants through ESCAPE land-use regression models and traffic exposure indicators. Meta-analyses of cohort-specific logistic regression on asthma incidence were performed. Models were adjusted for age, sex, overweight, education, and smoking and included city/area within each cohort as a random effect. Results: In this longitudinal analysis, asthma incidence was positively, but not significantly, associated with all exposure metrics, except for PM coarse. Positive associations of borderline significance were observed for nitrogen dioxide [adjusted odds ratio (OR) = 1.10; 95% CI: 0.99, 1.21 per 10 μg/m 3 ; p = 0.10] and nitrogen oxides (adjusted OR = 1.04; 95% CI: 0.99, 1.08 per 20 μg/m 3 ; p = 0.08). Nonsignificant positive associations were estimated for PM 10 (adjusted OR = 1.04; 95% CI: 0.88, 1.23 per 10 μg/m 3), PM 2.5 (adjusted OR = 1.04; 95% CI: 0.88, 1.23 per 5 μg/m 3), PM 2.5absorbance (adjusted OR = 1.06; 95% CI: 0.95, 1.19 per 10-5 /m), traffic load (adjusted OR = 1.10; 95% CI: 0.93, 1.30 per 4 million vehicles × meters/day on major roads in a 100-m buffer), and traffic intensity (adjusted OR = 1.10; 95% CI: 0.93, 1.30 per 5,000 vehicles/day on the nearest road). A nonsignificant negative association was estimated for PM coarse (adjusted OR = 0.98; 95% CI: 0.87, 1.14 per 5 μg/m 3). Conclusions: Results suggest a deleterious effect of ambient air pollution on asthma incidence in adults. Further research with improved personal-level exposure assessment (vs. residential exposure assessment only) and phenotypic characterization is needed.

Domaines: Pneumologie et système respiratoire; Santé publique et épidémiologie

Bénédicte Jacquemin, Valérie Siroux, Margaux Sanchez, Anne-Elie Carsin, Tamara Schikowski, et al.. Ambient Air Pollution and Adult Asthma Incidence in Six European Cohorts (ESCAPE). Environmental Health Perspectives, 2015, 123 (6), pp.613-621. ⟨10.1289/ehp.1408206.⟩. ⟨hal-04314643⟩