Weight Trajectories Among Youths Following Residential Relocation

Is moving to a different environment associated with body mass index (BMI) trajectories in young people through changes in the external exposome?In this cohort study of 4359 children and young adults (aged 2-24 years) in the Netherlands, Sweden, and the Czech Republic with more than 30 000 age- and sex-standardized BMI (z-BMI) observations, moving to areas with higher environmental hazards (ie, more air pollution or less green space) was associated with increases in z-BMI, particularly in the Dutch cohort, with similar associations seen with gray space in the Swedish cohort; the Czech cohort showed no clear associations.These findings suggest that greener, less polluted environments may help prevent unhealthy BMI trajectories in children and adolescents, with potential benefits differing across exposome domains and cohorts.

Corresponding Authors: Apolline Saucy, PhD, Institute of Social and Preventive Medicine (ISPM), Mittelstrasse 43, 3012 Bern, Switzerland (apolline.saucy@unibe.ch); Cathryn Tonne, PhD, Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal), C/ Doctor Aiguader, 88, 08003 Barcelona, Spain (cathryn.tonne@isglobal.org).

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