1,000 Feet In The Air… High Blood Pressure On The Ground
The roar at 5 PM every day was so deafening, I couldn’t even hold a conversation with my friends as we wandered across the campus for dinner…
That was the case when I was studying for my degree at Brunel University in west London, as Concorde screamed by us. The campus sits directly under the flight path for Heathrow Airport, just a few miles away.
Of course, although Concorde has now retired from the skies, the theory still stands for every other aircraft that roars into London’s hub every day. And even with strict restrictions in place at Heathrow between 11 PM and 7 AM, the current construction of a new runway could mean that the situation will get worse.
Until now, the common consensus was that aircraft noise is simply an inconvenience and an unwelcome “alarm clock” that disturbs sleep. But a new study shows that more than simply waking people up, or causing lack of sleep, aircraft noise can actually increase blood pressure – even when folks are asleep.
Researchers for the European Heart Journal monitored the blood pressure levels of 140 people who live near Heathrow and three other major European airports at 15-minute intervals.
They found that the participants’ blood pressure increased when the noise exceeded 35 decibels. Obviously, this could include a number of things (such as traffic noise and even snoring), but when you live under an airport’s flight path, chances are that aircraft noise is going to be the main contributor – particularly at night. The louder the noise; the more blood pressure rose.
In fact, every 10 decibels of aircraft noise can cause hypertension to spike by as much as 14%, with people who’ve lived under a flight path for five years or longer more susceptible to higher blood pressure or hypertension.
The study is an important one, since high blood pressure can lead to increased risk of heart attacks and strokes. Right now, the researchers plan to test exactly how aircraft noise heightens blood pressure levels, but it’s thought that the brain reacts to the noise by producing more cortisol in the body – the hormone that causes stress.
However, other key factors that can trigger higher blood pressure are obviously in play – such as job-based stress, financial issues, general health, diet, and exercise. What seems certain, however, is that in a world where people are working harder, living longer, and have more everyday stress, the market for blood pressure and hypertension drugs, such as those made by drug firms like Pfizer (NYSE: PFE), seems set to grow.
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