Traffic pollution raises risk of cancer, study says

Spending time in traffic or re-fuelling a car increases the exposure to cancer-causing chemicals, a 14-year Swedish study has found.

Every five years since 2000, the Swedish Environmental Protection Agency asked 40 random people in five Swedish cities to wear air-quality measuring devices around their necks and answer questions about their home and working lives.

The devices, which participants wore for a week and hung close to their beds at night, measured exposure to nitrogen dioxide, benzene, butadiene and formaldehyde.