Health Bulletin
Dirty air triggers more heart attacks than cocaine
Air pollution triggers more heart attacks than using cocaine and poses as high a risk of sparking a heart attack as alcohol, coffee and physical exertion, scientists said recently. Sex, anger, marijuana use and chest or respiratory infections can also trigger heart attacks to different extent, the researchers said, but air pollution, particularly in heavy traffic, is the major culprit. The findings suggest population-wide factors like polluted air should be taken more seriously when looking at heart risks, and should be put into context beside higher but relatively rarer risks like drug use. Tim Nawrot of Hasselt University in Belgium, who led the study, said he hoped his findings would also encourage doctors to think more often about population level risks. The World Health Organisation (WHO) describes air pollution as "a major environmental risk to health" and estimates that it causes around 2 million premature deaths worldwide every year.
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