Diabetes, Obesity Risk Increases As People Gets More Exposed To Air Pollution

Exposure to air pollution makes it even harder for weight conscious people to shed a pound. A new study conducted by the researchers from Duke University shows how air pollution can greatly affect one's risk for diabetes and obesity.

The study, which was published in the Journal of the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology, included two groups of lab rats. One group was exposed to Beijing air while the other to filtered air for 19 days.

The result of the study showed that the rats which were exposed to the overly polluted air of Beijing got 50 percent higher bad cholesterol, 46 percent higher triglyceride and 97 percent higher total cholesterol levels as compared to the other group. Also, as posted by Time, male rats exposed to pollution increased in weight for about 18 percent while female rats increased to10 percent.

"Since chronic inflammation is recognized as a factor contributing to obesity and since metabolic diseases such as diabetes and obesity are closely related, our findings provide clear evidence that chronic exposure to air pollution increases the risk for developing obesity," said Jungfeng Zhang, a professor of global and environmental health at Duke University and senior author of the journal.

Previous research revealed how air pollution can be a global health problem. In 2014, the study which was conducted by Harvard researchers showed how air pollution was linked to the declining lung conditions of over 22 million residents.

Meanwhile, obesity is now becoming a rising problem for young adults in China -- around11 percent of the population of people with ages between 20 and 39, as reported by Discovery. But according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Americans are still in the lead with over a third of the total U.S. adults population are now considered overweight.

Zhang said the study will soon be verified to humans. Once confirmed, "these findings will support the urgent need to reduce air pollution, given the growing burden of obesity in today's highly polluted world."