Household cleaning can be as bad as smoking for lung function

”People who have worked as cleaners or done household cleaning for 20 years have reduced lung function equivalent to smoking 20 cigarettes a day, for the same period of time,” says PHD-candidate Øistein Svanes, at the Department of Clinical Science, at the University of Bergen. He is main author of the study.

Publisert 21.05.2019 / Sist oppdatert 22.11.2021

The study also shows that cleaners have 40 per cent higher risk of developing asthma than others.

The research includes 6 000 participants, based on the European Community Respiratory Health Survey (ECRHS).

The study is published by the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, and is part of the Horizon 2020 project Aging Lungs in European Cohorts (ALEC).