Should You Worry About Gas Stoves?

The complexity of epidemiological research

Pictured: Bit of a waste. Throw a steak on there, at least. Photo by Mykola Makhlai on Unsplash

As a decent home cook, I love my gas stove. I have previously had electric burners, and while the better induction cooktops are pretty great, there’s nothing quite like a gas burner to really give you a feeling of immediate control over the temperature of your food.

So I was a bit distressed to see the news that, apparently, gas stoves are causing enormous health harms across the world. Headlines have abounded claiming that 12.7% of child asthma is caused by gas cooktops, and that the US Consumer Product Safety Commission is considering regulating gas stoves due to the public health risks.

See, that’s better. Hopefully there’s some stew in the pot. Mmmm, stew. Photo by KWON JUNHO on Unsplash

This all sounds very scary. Many of us have had gas stoves in our home for a large portion of our lives, and it’s worrying to think that such a simple thing could be causing us great harm. Even worse, most of these headlines are about gas stoves making children sick, which is even more stressful for people who are cooking their spaghetti on open flames.

However, the science isn’t quite as settled as you may have heard. There’s certainly some evidence that gas stoves may be bad for our…