Abstract
Background: Approximately half of the earth’s population in the rural areas of developing countries uses energy obtained from biomass burning, which is harmful to people. Objective: This study is aimed at determining which respiratory symptoms can be associated with biomass burning amongst fish smokers in the Oyorokoto fishing settlement. Methods: A community-based, cross-sectional questionnaire, which employed a modified cluster sampling technique, was used. Results: A total of 300 subjects were recruited for the study, of which 210 (70%) were fish smokers. The mean age was 31.46 ± 13.03 years, with the majority (42.0%) having only primary school education. The prevalence of respiratory symptoms amongst the subjects was 86.7%,the most frequent of which were catarrh (30.48%) and a cough (28.57%). The respiratory symptom occurring least frequently was breathlessness (2.38%). The symptoms most often experienced during fish smoking were those of catarrh (75.5%) and sneezing (73.0%), whereas breathlessness occurred the least, in only 7 (3.3%) of the participants. Sneezing stopped in 64.2% of the subjects after fish smoking had ceased. Most of the fish smoking took place indoors. Conclusion: Health promotion featuring preventive interventions, such as the wearing of facemasks and the use of modern fish smoking methods, which is associated with fewer health risks, is essential to improving the quality of life of fish smokers. The government’s provision of certain social services, including better education opportunities for the young, is advocated, and should be especially targeted at improving the lot of the girl child.
Highlights
Wood and other forms of biomass are the largest source of domestic energy in developing countries.[1,2] Approximately half of the earth’s population and over 90% of households in the rural areas of developing countries use the energy which they gain from burning biomass, such as wood, charcoal, animal excrement and agricultural residues.[2]
Fish smoking is without doubt the only occupation which is readily available to young women, who are likely to have acquired the skill during their childhood, when they would have assisted their mothers with their smoking activities
Our research has shown that some respiratory symptoms are associated with exposure to wood smoke
Summary
Wood and other forms of biomass are the largest source of domestic energy in developing countries.[1,2] Approximately half of the earth’s population and over 90% of households in the rural areas of developing countries use the energy which they gain from burning biomass, such as wood, charcoal, animal excrement and agricultural residues.[2] Biomass burning tends to result in a high level of indoor air pollution, which has an important global impact on mortality and morbidity rates.[1,2,3] The burning of biomass consists of three stages: (1) ignition, (2) flaming (burning and smoking with flame) and (3) smouldering (burning and smoking without flame). Half of the earth’s population in the rural areas of developing countries uses energy obtained from biomass burning, which is harmful to people
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