Solid fuel use is associated with anemia in children.

Over 3 billion people use solid fuels as a means of energy and heating source, and ~ 50% of households burn them in inefficient, poorly ventilated stoves. In 2010, ~ 43% of the 640 million preschool children in 220 countries suffered from a certain degree of anemia, with iron deficiency as the main cause in developed countries whereas its causes remained multifactorial in the undeveloped group. In this study, we explore the relations of country-wide variables that might affect the people's health status (from socioeconomic status to more specific variables such as water access). We found independent relationship between solid fuel use and anemia in children under five years old (p < 0.0001), taking into account the prevalence of anemia in pregnant woman and the access to improved water sources. Countries in which the population uses solid fuel the most have over three times higher anemia rates in children than countries with the lowest prevalence of solid fuels use. There is still a complex relationship between solid fuels use and anemia, as reflected in its worldwide significance (p < 0.05) controlled for measles immunization, tobacco consumption, anemia in pregnant mothers, girl's primary education, life expectancy and improved water access but not (p > 0.05) when weighing for sanitation access or income per capita.

Ecological study on solid fuel use and pneumonia in young children: A worldwide association.

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Pneumonia constitutes one of the major causes of worldwide mortality in young children. Poverty has been traditionally assigned as the underlying factor accounting for these trends. However, the independent role of solid fuel use yielding biomass pollution on pneumonia rates among young children has not been extensively examined. METHODS: Independent socio-economic variables, and the percentage of solid fuel use, tobacco consumption, improved water access source and sanitation facilities were extracted for each country from the available public databases. Multivariate regression analyses were performed to assess potential associations between these recognized risk factors and country pneumonia incidence in young children <5 years of age. RESULTS: Multivariate linear regression analyses yielded two models that accounted for approximately 87% of the variance, and included solid fuel use, tobacco consumption, sanitation access, measles immunization, life expectancy, access to electricity and the Human Development Index (HDI) as being independently associated with the number of annual pneumonia cases per child <5 years of age. CONCLUSION: In this ecological study, current country rates of pneumonia among young children are independently associated with the use of solid fuels. We postulate that interventions aimed at reducing indoor solid fuel biomass pollution through implementation of efficient stoves will translate into meaningful decreases in child mortality and morbidity.