Parkinson's: Pollution increases the risk

Exposure to PM10 air pollution increases the risk of developing Parkinson's. This is shown by a large study published in the international journal npj Parkinson's Disease analyzing data from citizens recruited in the Moli-sani epidemiological project, which for twenty years has followed about 25 thousand adults living in Molise.

The progressive accumulation of scientific evidence only confirms that chronic exposure to air pollution is not only associated with an increased risk of cardiovascular and respiratory diseases, but also plays a role in the onset of neurological diseases such as dementia and Parkinson's , contributing to the increase in incidence and prevalence of these neurodegenerative diseases. Trying to understand and measure the role of air pollutants, independently of other risk or protective factors, was the goal of researchers who, thanks to the large data available in the Molisani project, were able to simultaneously analyze different air pollutants, together with sociodemographic, lifestyle and professional exposures, for a 12-year follow-up. Being able to fully understand the mechanisms that lead to the onset of the disease is also essential to inform desirable effective prevention strategies , increasingly urgent as emerges from the air data, and which can be combined with the efforts underway in pharmacological research.

Starting from the data provided by the Regional Agency for Environmental Protection of Molise Arpa Molise, coming from fourteen monitoring stations, through geostatistical models a detailed picture of the environment in which each participant has lived over the years was reconstructed. This information was then cross-referenced with the appearance of cases of Parkinson's, identified on the basis of therapeutic prescriptions and hospital admissions.

The study, coordinated by the Epidemiology and Prevention Research Unit in collaboration with the Research and Clinical Neurophysiology Unit of the IRCCS Neuromed in Pozzilli and other Italian research centers and institutions, has identified a new link between the levels of PM10 microparticulate matter in the air and the increased risk of developing Parkinson's disease.

"We observed," says Alessandro Gialluisi, associate professor of Medical Statistics at the University Lum of Casamassima (Bari) and researcher at the Epidemiology and Prevention Unit of the Irccs Neuromed, as well as first author of the scientific work, "that an increase in the levels of PM10 in the air is associated with a significant increase in the risk of developing Parkinson's. This association, observed in subjects who were initially free from neurological pathologies, appears to be independent of a series of other risk factors that include age, sex, other prevalent pathologies and occupational factors."

This data, obtained in an Italian population and with a long observation period, supports the hypothesis of a central role of fine dust in increasing the risk of disease. "An interesting detail of the study" continues Gialluisi "concerns lipoprotein(a), a molecule already known for its role in cardiovascular risk and in cholesterol transport, which interacts with alpha-synuclein . This protein has been found, in fact, to be a possible mediator of the relationship between PM10 and Parkinson's risk, explaining a small but significant part of it. Naturally, further studies will be necessary to fully clarify its role".

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