Subtitle: How Low Birth Weight can point to social inequities like PM 2.5 pollution exposure
Data source: calenvironment.xlsx, ces_data
Background: Low birth weight rates across Bay Area counties can highlight where babies and birthing people face higher health and social risks, and suggest where underlying conditions like poverty, environmental exposures, and inequitable care are more severe. Using California Environment data from the Census, we can understand how different environmental exposures, specifically exposure to PM 2.5, have effect on health conditions of birthing people and babies within Bay Area counties.
Results: Marin county and Sonoma county had the lowest median Low Birth Weights (3.66, 3.75, respectively), while San Francisco had the highest (12.73), with one of the largest distributions among the Bay Area counties (1.20-12.73). Napa, Alameda, and Contra Costa counties saw the highest percentile of PM 2.5 exposure, each having regions in to 50-60 percentile range in the interactive map figure. Their Low Birth Weight distributions are as follows: Napa (0-6.52), Alameda (1.43-10.86), and Contra Costa (1.28-9.24). It is interesting that Napa county had some of the highest exposure to PM 2.5 pollutants, yet a less varied distribution of Low Birth Weight. However, Alameda county had a high Low Birth Weight result (10.86), which could point to an association between PM 2.5 exposure and Low Birth Weight in that specific county. More research will need to be done, for example, how poverty or other exposures affect Low Birth Weight. In contrast, other studies could be done to determine the effects of PM 2.5 exposure on health in the Bay Area by analyzing other health outcomes, for example asthma.