RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Household use of crop residues and fuelwood for cooking and newborn birth size in rural Bangladesh
JF Occupational and Environmental Medicine
JO Occup Environ Med
FD BMJ Publishing Group Ltd
SP 333
OP 338
DO 10.1136/oemed-2021-107908
VO 79
IS 5
A1 Lee, Mi-Sun
A1 Eum, Ki-Do
A1 Golam, Mostofa
A1 Quamruzzaman, Quazi
A1 Kile, Molly L
A1 Mazumdar, Maitreyi
A1 Christiani, David C
YR 2022
UL http://oem.bmj.com/content/79/5/333.abstract
AB Objectives We aimed to investigate the association between type of cooking biomass fuels (crop residues vs fuelwood) and newborn birth outcomes in Bangladeshi children.Methods In this birth cohort study, pregnant women who were 18 years or older with ultrasound confirmed singleton pregnancy of ≤16 weeks of gestation were enrolled from two Bangladesh clinics between January 2008 and June 2011. Exposure to cooking biomass fuels during pregnancy was assessed by an administered questionnaire. The newborn size metrics were measured at the time of delivery. We used multiple linear regression and logistic regression to assess the associations between the type of cooking biomass fuels and birth outcomes after adjusting for covariates.Results A total of 1137 participants were using biomass fuels, including crop residues (30.3%) and fuelwood (69.7%), respectively, for cooking. After adjusting for covariates, the use of crop residues for cooking was associated with a 0.13 SD decrease in birth length (95% CI 0.25 to −0.01), a 0.14 SD decrease in head circumference (95% CI −0.27 to –0.02), and increased risk of low birth weight (LBW, OR 1.52, 95% CI 1.07 to 2.15) compared with the use of fuelwood.Conclusion The use of crop residues for cooking was associated with reduced birth size and increased risk for LBW in Bangladeshi children, implying that the use of crop residues during pregnancy may have a detrimental effect on fetal growth.Deidentified data are available on reasonable request. Individuals or groups who would like to use the data to address specific scientific questions must provide a proposal to the study principal investigator (DCC, email: dchris@hsph.harvard.edu) for full consideration. For more information, please email at mslee@hsph.harvard.edu.