Medical News
Health
25 June 2019
Munshi Ahmed/Bloomberg via Getty By New Scientist Staff and Press Association
Air pollution seems to negatively affect an important measure of female fertility. Though the biggest contributing factor was a woman’s age, daily exposure to high levels of pollution was also associated with a decline in potential fertility.
The findings are based on hormone measurements taken from 1318 women in Modena, Italy. The study focused on anti-Mullerian hormone or AMH, which is released by cells in the ovary and is thought to represent the number of viable eggs a woman has – known as ovarian reserve.
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The hormone measurements were compared with the amount of exposure each person had to air pollution on a daily basis, such as to particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide gas, which is produced from burning fuel.
The most significant factor on AMH levels was a woman’s age, with levels declining after the age of 25. However, AMH levels were inversely related to air pollution too.
“Living in an area associated with high levels of air pollutants in our study increased the risk of severely reduced ovarian reserve by a factor of two or three,” says Antonio La Marca at the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia in Italy, who presented the finding at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology annual meeting in Vienna. The results have not yet been peer-reviewed.
The study did not measure the individual women’s exposure to pollution, says Richard Anderson at the University of Edinburgh. “While this does not suggest a short-term problem for women trying to fall pregnant, it might indicate that women exposed to high levels of pollution might have a shorter opportunity to achieve a family, and even an earlier menopause,” he says. “However this sort of study cannot clearly show cause and effect, and it might be another aspect of the women’s lifestyle or environment that is the key factor.”
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