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Abstract
Cooking with dirty-burning fuels is associated with health risk from household air pollution. We assessed the prevalence of and factors associated with the use of cooking fuels, and attitudes and barriers towards use of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). This was a cross-sectional, population-based survey conducted in 519 households in Lagos, Nigeria. We used a structured questionnaire to obtain information regarding choice of household cooking fuel and the attitudes towards the use of LPG. Kerosene was the most frequently used cooking fuel (n = 475, 91.5%; primary use n = 364, 70.1%) followed by charcoal (n = 159, 30.6%; primary use n = 88, 17%) and LPG (n = 86, 16.6%; primary use n = 63, 12.1%). Higher level of education, higher income and younger age were associated with LPG vs. kerosene use. Fuel expenditure on LPG was significantly lower than for kerosene ( (Naira) 2169.0 ± 1507.0 vs. 2581.6 ± 1407.5). Over 90% of non-LPG users were willing to switch to LPG but cited safety issues and high cost as potential barriers to switching. Our findings suggest that misinformation and beliefs regarding benefits, safety and cost of LPG are important barriers to LPG use. An educational intervention program could be a cost-effective approach to improve LPG adoption and should be formally addressed through a well-designed community-based intervention study.
Highlights
Household air pollution (HAP) is the single most important adverse environmental health risk factor globally and accounts for about 4.3 million premature deaths annually [1,2]
Health benefits thought to be related to kerosene use was the main reason for switching to kerosene by biomass users while cost of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), fear of fire with LPG use, restrictions by landlords and unavailability of LPG were the main reasons for switching from LPG to kerosene
We found that kerosene is used as cooking fuel in most household in this densely populated area of Lagos with less than a fifth of the households using LPG
Summary
Household air pollution (HAP) is the single most important adverse environmental health risk factor globally and accounts for about 4.3 million premature deaths annually [1,2]. Most of these deaths occur in low and middle-income countries (LMIC) and are attributable primarily to pneumonia in children and non-communicable cardiorespiratory diseases in adults [1]. The use of dirty-burning cooking fuels that emit high levels of pollutants such as fine particulate matter (PM2.5 ) and carbon monoxide (CO) is a major source of HAP and are associated with exposure-related adverse health effects [3]. Public Health 2018, 15, 641; doi:10.3390/ijerph15040641 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph
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