Pregnant women living in Texas neighborhoods with higher air levels of benzene – a pollutant oftenreleased from oil refineries and traffic exhaust – are more likely to have babies with neural tube defects.Women living in the areas with the highest benzene levels had a two times greater risk for their childrento be born with spina bifida. This study is the first to examine the link between environmental levels ofbenzene and neural tube defects in newborns and adds to the growing body of evidence linking prenatalair pollution exposures to harmful effects on the developing fetus.

 
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