How Many US Kids Have Asthma? Numbers Are Climbing
“While we don’t know why more people are now being diagnosed with asthma, there are some noteworthy trends associated with childhood instances that may shed some light on what’s going on. In two recently published studies out of Rice University, for example, researchers found that children living in poverty and in economically and socially disadvantaged neighborhoods in Houston were more likely than their peers to develop asthma. In fact, as the Houston Chronicle reported, black children in city regions were three times more likely than their white counterparts to have the condition — while, nationally, 13 percent of black children and 7 percent of white children were reported to have it. The researchers also found that Houston kids on public insurance were 21 percent more likely to have asthma than those on private plans.”