SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Truck drivers are percent more likely to get heart disease than the general population due to exposure to diesel exuast emissions, according to a Harvard University study.

According to a report by The Sacramento Bee, the findings are part of the most comprehensive study ever conducted on the effects of diesel engine emissions on trucking industry.

Harvard Medical School researchers examined the jobs and medical histories of more than 54,000 male Teamsters union members who had worked for one of four national trucking companies from 1985 through 2000. It also looked at office clerks, engine mechanics and dockworkers exposed to exhaust in the yard.

Researchers said they were not surprised that trucking workers had a lower overall death rate than the general population. But they were struck by the higher death rates for heart disease, particularly among truck drivers — 49 percent — and dockworkers, 32 percent.

However, the study did not take into account workers’ lifestyles and diet, and smoking, which could also explain the higher rates of heart attacks and lung cancer.

Last year, the union representing Canada’s border officers launched an investigation to find out if gas and diesel emissions from idling cars and trucks lined up at border crossings is affecting officers’ health.

Prolonged exposure to diesel exhaust, which is arguably a cause of cancer, is a particular concern for officers who work near transport trucks that queue up in their approach to Canada-U.S. border crossings.

In 2002, the Environmental Protection Agency released a controversial 651-page study that concluded diesel exhaust probably causes lung cancer.
While the report noted the long-term health effects of exposure to diesel engine exhaust were uncertain, “the evidence for a potential cancer hazard to humans resulting from chronic inhalation exposure to [diesel emissions] is persuasive.”

— with files from the Sacramento Bee