Relationship between lung function and indoor air pollution.

Sir,

The recent report on the, ‘Relationship between lung function and indoor air pollution’ among rural women in the fishing community is very interesting.[1] Umoh and Peters noted that ‘chronic exposure to biomass smoke is associated with chronic bronchitis and reduced lung function in women engaged in fish smoking’.[1] Of interest, there is another publication by Umoh et al., focusing on the problem of chronic bronchitis in the same community and same period, in the Niger delta.[2] Umoh et al. have further mentioned a relationship between exposure to smoke and anxiety.[2] Overall, the number of subjects investigated in both reports (342 VS 342)[12] is equal, however, the number of the cases with chronic bronchitis is not equal (68 VS 63). This leads to the query on the reliability of the present report. In addition, there is no report on the environment of the community. The main query is whether there is any other pollution in this area, in addition to fish smoking.