Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2025 May 19.
doi: 10.1007/s10552-025-02010-6. Online ahead of print.

Long-term exposure to air pollution and lung cancer incidence: findings from improved exposure assessment and extended population

Jeongho Park  1 , Ok-Jin Kim  2 , Miyoun Shin  3 , Euijun Choi  1 , Sungchan Kang  4 , Seung-Sik Hwang  4 , Young-Jae Cho  5 , Sun-Young Kim  6
Affiliations

Long-term exposure to air pollution and lung cancer incidence: findings from improved exposure assessment and extended population

Jeongho Park et al. Cancer Causes Control. .

Abstract

Purpose: Accumulating evidence suggested long-term exposure to air pollution as a risk factor of lung cancer. Recent efforts confirmed the association based on extended population and individual exposure by leveraging administrative databases and complete address information. However, few studies achieved simultaneous improvements. Using the 2 million cohort along with their individual residential exposures, this study aimed to investigate the association of four criteria pollutants and incident lung cancer in the Seoul Metropolitan Area, South Korea.

Methods: Our study population included 2,035,278 people aged ≥ 30 years and without cancer for 2002-2006 from the National Health Insurance System database. We identified lung cancer incidence for 2007-2016 and assessed individual long-term exposure to particulate matter ≤ 10 µm and 2.5 µm in diameter (PM10 and PM2.5), nitrogen dioxide (NO2), and ozone at participants' home addresses by using previously validated exposure prediction models. Using time-varying Cox proportional hazard models, we estimated hazard ratios (HRs) per interquartile range increase in each pollutant concentration adjusting for individual and area-level characteristics.

Results: There were 18,229 lung cancer new cases over 10 years. We did not find the association for all four pollutants (PM10: HR = 0.99 [95% Confidence Interval = 0.93-1.04]; PM2.5: 0.97 [0.92-1.02]; NO2: 1.00 [0.96-1.05]; and ozone: 1.01 [0.98-1.04]). The extended stratified and sensitivity analyses mostly showed null associations.

Conclusion: Our findings of no association contradictory to existing evidence, despite the considerable improvement in exposure assessment and population size, suggest further examination by integrating histological variation and indoor and/or personal exposure.

Keywords: Air quality; Carcinogen; Cohort study; Exposure assessment; Long-term association.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Declarations. Conflicts of interest: The authors declare no competing interests. Ethical approval: Our study protocol was authorized by the Institutional Review Board committee in the Seoul National University Bundang Hospital (IRB No. X-2101–661-904). Informed consent was waived.

References

    1. Hamra GB, Guha N, Cohen A, Laden F, Raaschou-Nielsen O, Samet JM et al (2014) Outdoor particulate matter exposure and lung cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Environ Health Perspect 122:906–911. https://doi.org/10.1289/ehp/1408092 - DOI - PubMed - PMC
    1. Hamra GB, Laden F, Cohen AJ, Raaschou-Nielsen O, Brauer M, Loomis D (2015) Lung cancer and exposure to nitrogen dioxide and traffic: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Environ Health Perspect 123:1107–1112. https://doi.org/10.1289/ehp.1408882 - DOI - PubMed - PMC
    1. Yu P, Guo S, Xu R, Ye T, Li S, Sim MR et al (2021) Cohort studies of long-term exposure to outdoor particulate matter and risks of cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Innovation 2:100143. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.xinn.2021.100143 - DOI - PubMed - PMC
    1. Cheng I, Yang J, Tseng C, Wu J, Shariff-Marco S, Park SL et al (2022) Traffic-related air pollution and lung cancer incidence: the California multiethnic cohort study. Am J Respir Crit Care Med 206:1008–1018. https://doi.org/10.1164/rccm.202107-1770OC - DOI - PubMed - PMC
    1. Hvidtfeldt UA, Severi G, Andersen ZJ, Atkinson R, Bauwelinck M, Bellander T et al (2021) Long-term low-level ambient air pollution exposure and risk of lung cancer – a pooled analysis of 7 European cohorts. Environ Int 146:106249. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2020.106249 - DOI - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources