Many Brits are gearing up for the encroaching cold weather, getting excited about cosy nights reading by the fire. However,home owners with wood burners have been issued a warning over the damage open fires can cause to one’s health. This may be surprising to many, but scientists have shared that this side effect is often hidden because owners of wood burners are often wealthier and, therefore, healthier on average.
The University College of London (UCL) have published research which examined the health and fuel-use of 11,000 case studies, as part of the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing. Researchers found that, over an eight year period, the average lung function decreased by 120ml in those who used wood-burning stoves, whereas people relying on other heating methods only showed a 70ml drop.
Significantly, this study discovered that wood-burning devices were most likely to be used by white residents of wealthy neighbourhoods, making the damage to their health often hard to spot, as these same households generally had higher foundations of good health.
A principal researcher at UCL’s Institute of Health Informatics, Dr Laura Horsfall, explained: “People using solid fuel had lower rates of smoking and lung disease, which can mask the true effects of solid fuel exposure. However, using repeated lung function measurements over an eight-year period, we found that lung function declined faster among solid fuel users compared to non-users, even after adjusting for socioeconomic and housing factors”.
Interestingly, she shared that this pointed towards a notable link “between solid fuel use and respiratory decline, despite the healthier baseline of the exposed group”.
Horsfall went on, adding: “Our study suggests that high levels of particulate matter from stoves damage respiratory tissues, causing inflammation in a similar way to cigarette smoke”. And whilst the result appears not to refer to as much smoking — which has been confirmed to annually reduce lung function by 40ml to 60ml — experts still agree that wood-burning appliances could impact health.
The study measured lung function via FEV1, which refers to the amount of air a person can forcefully exhale in the first second of a breath. Lower values of this testing correlates with an increased possibility of asthma, lung disease and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Numbers from 2022 show only 9.4% of houses featured wood burners. This has since risen to 10.3% as of last year.
Head of the European Respiratory Society’s expert group on epidemiology and environment, Professor Ane Johannessen, stated: “This underscores the need for clearer public health guidance and regulation around domestic wood burning. People should be aware that these stoves could be harming them and their families, and doctors should be asking their patients about whether they are using stoves at home”.
Sarah Sleet, Chief Executive of Asthma and Lung UK, expressed her concern over the increase in appliances in UK homes because of the “aesthetic of it”, adding that this was only more evidence of the impact of air pollution from wood burners on our lungs.