Association Between Ambient Air Pollution and Multiple Sclerosis: a Systemic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract The effects of air pollutants on autoimmune diseases are gaining increasing attention. At present, no studies have conducted systemic review and meta-analysis on ambient air pollution and multiple sclerosis (MS). In this paper, literature was collected in order to explore whether there was a connection between air pollutants and MS or not. Through electronic literature search, literature related to our research topic was collected in Cochrane Library, Embase and Pubmed till August 18, 2020 according to certain criteria. Pooled risk estimate and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI) were calculated by random-effect model analysis. After removing copies, browsing titles and abstracts and reading full text, 6 studies were finally included. The results showed that only particulate matter (PM) with aerodynamic diameter ≤10 (PM10) was related to MS (pooled HR=1.058, 95% CI=1.050-1.066), and no correlation was found between other pollutants and MS. There was no publication bias, and the heterogeneity analysis results were stable. PM is correlated with the disease MS, while other pollution is not connected with MS. More literature results need to be included to meta-analysis results for further study.