Abstract
BackgroundThere is growing interest in health risks of residents living near concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). Previous research mostly focused on swine CAFOs and self-reported respiratory conditions. The aim was to study the association between the presence of swine, poultry, cattle and goat CAFOs and health of Dutch neighbouring residents using electronic medical records from general practitioners (GPs).MethodsData for the year 2009 were collected of 119,036 inhabitants of a rural region with a high density of CAFOs using information from GIAB (high exposed population). A comparison was made with GP data from 78,060 inhabitants of rural areas with low densities of CAFOs (low exposed population). Associations between the number of CAFOs near residents’ homes and morbidity were determined by multilevel (cross-classified) logistic regression.ResultsIn 2009, the prevalence of most respiratory and gastrointestinal conditions was similar in the high and low exposed population. Exceptions were pneumonia, atopic eczema and unspecified infectious diseases with an increased prevalence, and sinusitis with a decreased prevalence in the high exposed population. Within the high CAFO density region, the number of poultry, cattle and swine CAFOs near residents’ homes was not associated with allergic, respiratory or gastrointestinal conditions. Conversely, each additional goat CAFO within the postal code area of residents’ homes significantly increased the odds of unspecified infectious disease and pneumonia by 87 and 41 percent, respectively.ConclusionsUsing GP records, pneumonia and unspecified infectious diseases were positively associated with the number of goat CAFOs near residents’ homes, but no association was found between swine, cattle, and poultry CAFOs and respiratory, allergic or gastrointestinal conditions.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s12940-016-0123-2) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
There is growing interest in health risks of residents living near concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs)
Most published studies are based on patient-reported symptoms, while it is known that prevalence estimates derived from self-reported data deviate from those obtained from general practitioners’ (GPs) medical records [8]
Between December 2009 and March 2010, general practices located in rural postal code areas (
Summary
There is growing interest in health risks of residents living near concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs). The aim was to study the association between the presence of swine, poultry, cattle and goat CAFOs and health of Dutch neighbouring residents using electronic medical records from general practitioners (GPs). There is growing attention for health problems of residents living in the proximity of livestock farms. Several studies have addressed the possible adverse health effects of animal farm emissions among neighbouring residents, there are still issues that need further investigation. In several studies it was Hooiveld et al Environmental Health (2016) 15:24 unclear whether the research involved animal farms in general or concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFOs), because detailed information about the livestock population size was lacking [2]. Most studies focussed on respiratory health and allergies, but only a few addressed the possible relation between CAFOs and GI outcomes [9, 10]
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