Air pollution is making women fatter: new study

It seems that all that water weight may actually be from air.

A new study suggests that long-term air pollution exposure is linked Weight gain in women – especially women in their 40s and late 50s, EurekAlert reports.

observed women who were exposed to poor air quality, particularly high levels of fine particles such as nitrogen dioxide and ozone Their body size increasesAccording to study author Jean Wang, an epidemiology research investigator at the University of Michigan.

Exposure to air pollution was associated with higher body fat, fat ratio and lower fat mass for middle-aged women. EurekAlert notes that “body fat increased by 4.5% or about 2.6 pounds.”

The data came from a mix of 1,654 white, black, Chinese and Japanese women with an average age of 50. They were tracked for eight years from 2000 to 2008.

Their residential addresses were used to measure the relative air pollution around their homes, looking for a link between the two entities.

However, according to the outlet, exercise and physical activity acted as buffers for the effects of these findings.

Wang also said that because the study only focused on middle-aged women, the findings may not be generalizable to younger — or older — women or men.