Darby Jack discusses potential health benefits of cleaner cookstoves

PBS NewsHour episode on Ghana randomized air pollution and health study (GRAPHS)

CLIMATE AND HEALTH Feb. 23 2017

Darby Jack, PhD, Assistant Professor of Environmental Health Sciences, was featured on PBS NewsHour along with his colleague, Dr. Kwaku Poku Asante, from the Kintampo Health Research Center. They describe their project, Ghana randomized air pollution and health study (GRAPHS), through which they recruit pregnant mothers and provide cleaner-burning cookstoves to reduce exposures of mothers and infants to harmful smoke. Mothers and infants  wear personal monitors that measure carbon dioxide and particulate matter levels. About 3.5 million people die annually due to household air pollution (HAP), which include smoke from cooking with solid fuels. Women who are primary cooks of the household and their infants are at a greater risk of exposure to biomass smoke. Through this study, Jack and colleagues are testing two hypotheses 1) will reduced exposure to household air pollution increase birth weight and 2) will reduced exposure reduce the rate of pneumonia in the first year of life.

Watch the episode here.