This link provides a synopsis of an Alzheimer's Association conference presentation yesterday (July 26) on multiple studies in the US and France on the beneficial effect of reduced exposure to particulate air pollution for brain health. Even when air quality improved during the later years of life, the women still benefited.
Improved air quality was tied to lower dementia risk and slower cognitive decline, studies presented at the Alzheimer's Association International Conference (AAIC) showed.
Dementia risk dropped by 26% in older women who lived in U.S. locations with greater reductions in traffic-related nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and by 14% in areas with a greater decline in fine particulate matter (PM2.5), said Xinhui Wang, PhD, of University of Southern California. These relationships occurred regardless of age, education, geographic region, APOE4 genotype, or cardiovascular risk.
Similar findings emerged in France, where reduced fine particulate matter concentrations were tied to a lower risk of all-cause dementia and Alzheimer's disease, reported Noémie Letellier, PhD, of University of California San Diego.
Moreover, long-term air pollution exposure was linked to higher plasma beta-amyloid levels in U.S. adults, according to research presented by Christina Park, MPH, of University of Washington in Seattle.
Last year, the Lancet Commission added late-life air pollution exposure to its list of key modifiable risk factors for dementia...
"Our findings are important because they strengthen the evidence that high levels of outdoor air pollution in later life harm our brains and also provide new evidence that, by improving air quality, we may be able to significantly reduce risk of cognitive decline and dementia," Wang said.