In a small project, 85 people reported fewer symptoms, fewer hospital visits and less missed work or school after replacing gas stoves, prompting calls for further tests.
Eighty-five people with poorly controlled asthma in Cleveland reported improved symptoms a few months after replacing gas stoves with electric ones, Science News reported on October 23. In questionnaires, participants also reported fewer emergency-room or hospital visits and less time off work or school. The small study does not establish that the stove replacements caused those changes.
The project addressed a known household exposure: burning gas in a stove or oven releases nitrogen dioxide, a pollutant that can trigger asthma symptoms. Exposure to the gas has been linked to more wheezing, coughing and asthma attacks in children.
Ashwini Sehgal, a clinician who studies community health at Case Western Reserve University, helped lead the project with funding from the US Environmental Protection Agency. The original plan was to follow 1,200 households for 12 months. The Trump administration terminated the agency’s Community Change Grants early, sharply reducing participation.
Sehgal and colleagues put the reported symptom improvement at roughly two to three times the benefit typically achieved with asthma medication. That was a comparison with typical medication benefits, not a head-to-head trial showing that stove replacement worked better than treatment. Participants with the worst symptoms reported the largest improvements.
Analysis
The findings came from a small group answering questionnaires, without a randomized comparison group. They show reported symptom relief, not measured improvements in lung function. Those limits leave open how much of the change was due to replacing the stoves.
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Seasonal effects also need to be accounted for, says environmental epidemiologist Carrie Breton of WashU Bursky School of Public Health in St. Louis. Laura Paulin, a lung specialist at Dartmouth Health, notes that asthma has many triggers. Symptoms can therefore change for reasons other than a stove replacement.
For people considering a change, Sehgal suggests trying an electric hot plate and toaster oven while keeping the gas stove off to see whether symptoms improve. Paulin recommends an exhaust hood that vents outdoors or an open window to reduce exposure during cooking. She also advises keeping children with asthma out of the kitchen while the gas stove is on.
For stronger evidence, Breton calls for measuring lung function before and after stove replacement. Sehgal proposes a randomized trial in which some participants receive electric stoves immediately and others wait six months. That would give researchers a comparison group to help assess whether the switch causes the reported benefit.
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