Hair Loss Due To Pollution And Environmental Factors

In today’s times it is increasingly common to find men and women balding in their early 20’s. These people are diagnosed to have hereditary baldness. However a look at their family history often reveals that their parent suffered from baldness only in their late 50’s or 60’s. Then why is it that people are now losing hair so early in life? The research below can answer this question.

In a research carried out at The University of London, scientists found that certain pollutants in the air affect the hair protein called keratin, thus hampering the process of hair growth. In the study, samples of hair follicles were removed from the scalp of people staying in different areas. The samples removed from more polluted areas showed higher degrees of “oxidative stress”, a process known to cause damage to follicular hair growth. This clearly shows that heredity alone does not play a role here. Hair loss due to pollution and environmental factors like change of water, stress, exposures to toxins etc play a role in hastening up baldness.

There was an interesting study which was carried out in the fishes in South China Sea, an area highly polluted with pesticides, revealing a shocking fact. Most male fishes either had completely lost, or were in the process of losing, most of their male characteristics and there were a high number of female fishes. The study concluded that many male fishes were simply converting into female fishes and this was believed to be due to high chemical content in the water there. This shows how adverse environmental changes can lead to a host of hormonal problems, leading to early and premature changes in the body.

These studies have confirmed the belief and now put the entire phenomena of early hair loss or premature baldness in more concrete terms. They have helped change the treatment approach as well. So far there has been an excessive hype, mostly driven by pharmaceutical companies on heredity or genetics being the sole cause of hair loss. Most patients continue to lose hair in spite of taking the medicines which deal with hereditary hair loss. This research has now explained why, and thereby has also removed the unnecessary emphasis that was placed on heredity or genetics. Instead a more wholesome approach where both genetics and environmental factors are taken into consideration helps in much better long term control of hair loss, and also allows the patient to be less dependent on medication.