Industrial air pollution and newborn hearing screening failure

Abstract

Hearing loss in newborns is a prevalent issue that can hinder the growth of language skills and cognitive development. Given that hearing loss often co-occurs with other adverse birth outcomes and the recognized role of metals in causing such outcomes, it is conceivable that metals may also serve as a risk factor of hearing loss. This study examined the associations between maternal residential exposure to thirteen PM_2.5-bound metals and failure in Newborn Hearing Screening (NHS) in offspring in New Mexico from 2008 to 2017 to ascertain possible implications of these environmental exposures. This retrospective cohort study included 141,406 births (7670 births in disease group and 133,736 births in non-diseased group) in New Mexico during 2008-2017. Thirteen PM_2.5-bound metals released from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) facilities were investigated potentially as risk factors. The RSEI model estimated maternal residential exposure to PM_2.5-bound metals during pregnancy, and spatial log-binomial regressions, adjusted for confounders, calculated adjusted relative risks (aRRs) for the association with NHS failure. Findings indicated that maternal residential exposure to PM_2.5-bound metals – including antimony, barium, beryllium, chromium, cobalt, manganese, mercury, vanadium, and zinc – during pregnancy were positively associated with NHS failure in offspring, showing aRRs ranging from 1.07 to 2.18. A significant trend was observed when exposures were categorized as zero, low, medium, and high of these metals. Our findings indicate that maternal exposure to these PM_2.5-bound metals may adversely affect newborn hearing, underscoring air pollution as a modifiable risk factor for improving hearing health outcomes.