Asthma epidemic shows no sign of abating
according to figures released today during the World Asthma Meeting
in Bangkok, Thailand, and the UK has the highest rate in the world.
Experts from the Global Initiative for Asthma estimate that 1 in 20 people in the world now have the disease, and it could affect as many as 300 million people worldwide.
The findings underscore the need for continued research into new pharmacological approaches to treat asthma, as well as the optimal use of existing therapies.
The increases are correlated with growing urbanisation and the adoption of more Western lifestyles by communities around the globe, according to the report's authors, who believe that as these trends continue, asthma will continue to increase.
The study also found that 18 per cent of all Scottish people have symptoms associated with asthma, leading the world's ranking for the disorder, ahead of Wales (17 per cent) and England (15.3 per cent).
This contrasts markedly with the situation in Switzerland, where just 2.3 per cent of the population is affected by asthma, and in Greece where the rate is 1.9 per cent.
One of the authors of the Global Burden of Asthma Report, Richard Beasley of the Medical Research Institute of New Zealand, said that the findings reveal for the first time the scale of the global burden of asthma.
"Until there is a greater understanding of the factors that cause asthma, and novel public health and pharmacological measures become available, the priority is to ensure that cost-effective management approaches are available to as many asthmatic individuals as possible worldwide," he added.
If not effectively treated, asthma often leads to hospitalisation, missed work and school, limitations on physical activity, sleepless nights and in some cases death.
Asthma is responsible for some 180,000 deaths a year, according to GINA, which was set in 1993 with the aim of cutting child asthma deaths by at least 50 per cent, reduce childhood hospitalisation for asthma by a quarter and halve the number of school days lost through asthma.
Yet the GINA report suggests that in many countries, people with asthma cannot get access to proper medication because of poverty, poor education, and poor infrastructure. And in countries where medications are widely available, they are often under-utilised.
