There has been a long-held belief that inner-city kids are more likely to have asthma because of where they live. A new study is saying that race, ethnicity, and income may make more of a difference than where kids live in increasing the risk of who gets asthma.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins Children's Center in Baltimore found no difference in the risk of developing asthma between children living in urban areas and those living in the suburbs or rural areas. They did find that the incidence of asthma is surprisingly uneven, however. They found a link between poverty and being African-American or Puerto Rican and a higher than average risk of asthma.
Their study looked at information from the parents or caregivers of more than 23,000 children, aged 6 to 17, across the United States. Asthma rates in these children were 20% for Puerto Ricans, 17% for African American, 10% for whites, 9% for other Hispanics, and 8% for Asians. Thirteen percent of inner-city kids had asthma, compared to 11% of kids who live in the suburbs or rural areas, numbers that are not significantly different. Being African American or Puerto Rican was a risk factor for asthma even after study controlled for such things as where the child lived, neighborhood poverty, and household income.
The theory had been that life in inner cities caused an increased risk of asthma because of exposure to pollution, indoor smoke, allergens from cockroaches and other pests, and because of a higher incidence of premature births. This idea was first formulated about 50 years ago. While pollution and allergens increase the risk of asthma, these problems may no longer be restricted to inner cities.
"Our findings suggest that focusing on inner cities as the epicenters of asthma may lead physicians and public health experts to overlook newly emerging 'hot zones' with high asthma rates," Dr. Elizabeth Matsui, a pediatric asthma specialist and associate professor of pediatrics and epidemiology at Johns Hopkins, said in a news release.
However, the authors of the study note that this finding is based strictly on where children with asthma lived, not on how severe their asthma was.