A controversial study on the association of asthma with cooking with gas ovens What's the story?

New research holds cooking with natural gas responsible for about 12% of childhood asthma cases in the United States. The authors of the study say that the results of their research indicated that about 650,000 American children would not have developed asthma if their homes had electric cooking ovens.

New research blaming natural gas cooking for about 12% of childhood asthma cases has sparked a debate about the health risks of kitchen ovens, with calls for tougher rules in the United States.

The study authors said that their research results indicated that about 650,000 American children would not have developed asthma if their homes had electric or induction cookers, compared to the harmful effect of gas-fired types.

However, an expert who participated in the study expressed doubts about its results and confirmed that gas is still healthier than cooking with wood or coal, which are estimated to cause 3.2 million deaths annually as a result of household air pollution, especially in developing countries. .

The US study, which was peer-reviewed, was published last month in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.

The study was based on calculating the risk of asthma in homes with gas cookers, as well as information from a 2013 report that includes 41 previous studies.

And when the numbers resulting from the calculation were combined with the census data in the United States, it was concluded that 12.7% of the cases of asthma in children in the United States are caused by cooking with gas ovens.

The same figures were used in 2018 in research showing that 12.3% of childhood asthma cases in Australia were caused by the use of gas stoves.

In addition, a report issued on Monday was based on the same figures and concluded that 12% of childhood asthma cases in European Union countries are attributed to cooking in gas ovens.

The report, which has not been peer-reviewed, was issued by the CLASP Group and the European Alliance for Public Health.

The level of nitrogen dioxide does not meet the recommendations

The European report included computer simulations conducted by the Dutch research organization TNO to analyze exposure to air pollution in household kitchens across Europe.

The recorded level of nitrogen dioxide exceeded the recommendations of the European Union and the World Health Organization several times a week in all kitchens, with the exception of the large ones that contain machines to extract air outside the homes.

The World Health Organization notes that nitrogen dioxide, which is emitted when gas is burned, is "a pollutant closely associated with asthma and other respiratory diseases."

This year, the CLASSP group will collect air quality data from 280 kitchens across Europe, in an effort to confirm the results.

The research comes as regulations for gas stoves are tightened in the United States.

"not clean"

Rob Jackson of Stanford University previously published a study showing that methane can escape from gas stoves even when they are turned off. He pointed out that the American study "was supported by several other studies that concluded that inhaling indoor pollution caused by gas may cause asthma."

But researchers seeking to make sense of the 3 billion people who still cook with harmful solid fuels like coal and wood have their own concern.

Daniel Pope, a professor of global public health at the University of Liverpool in the United Kingdom, said that the link between asthma and pollution from gas stoves has not been conclusively proven, indicating that more research is needed in this regard.

Bob is part of a team conducting research commissioned by the World Health Organization to summarize the effects that different types of fuels used for cooking and heating can have on health.

Pope told AFP that the results, which will be published later this year, indicate a "significant reduction in risk" when people abandon solid fuels and kerosene in favor of gas.

He added that the results indicated that there are "minor (mostly insignificant) effects of gas compared to electricity on all health conditions, including asthma."

Commenting on these findings, Brady Sales said the study did not hypothesize a causal relationship between asthma and cooking gas, and instead reported an association between gas exposure and disease based on studies dating back to the 1970s.

He continued, "I think that the international community's failure to explicitly acknowledge the well-known danger of gas ovens is a major problem."