Impact of domestic smokes on the prevalence of acute respiratory infection (ARI) among under-five children: Evidence from India

Abstract

BackgroundAcute respiratory infection (ARI) is one of the major causes of childhood morbidity which leads to mortality as well. AimThe study aimed to estimate the effect of household cooking fuels and smoking habits on the prevalence of ARI among under-five children over India. MethodsThis study employs nationally representative data National Family Health Survey (NFHS-4: 2015–2016) which was gathered and arranged by International Institute for Population Science, Mumbai as the Nodal Agency under the patronage of the Ministry of Health and Family welfare, Government of India. The χ2 test implemented to assess the difference by the prevalence of ARI against the use of household cooking fuels, smoking habits and socio-demographic characteristics. Then binary logistic regression models were incorporated to look at the crude and net impact of cooking fuels used in households on childhood ARI. Result & FindingsARI was mostly affective for those children who were from those households where biomasses were the main source of cooking fuels and significantly the prevalence of ARI was related to the combustion of biomass fuels for cooking (p < 0.0005). The smoking habits (OR = 1.42, CI: 1.18–1.70) and use of biomass cooking fuels (OR = 1.03, CI: 0.86–1.08) significantly predicted the higher probability of ARI prevalence among children. Therefore children should be kept away from the kitchen during cooking and the kitchen room should have sufficient open space to evacuate the pollutants easily.